A Space Art Gallery for NSS

Some time ago I had proposed to the National Space Society that a space art gallery be created on its web site. I proposed this idea following the success of the NSS Space Settlement Art Contest.

Many of you are probably aware of the Space Settlement Art Contest that I organized and ran for the National Space Society (NSS - nss.org) a few years ago. The winning art from that contest was used to illustrate the NSS Space Settlement Calendar. As a follow up to that I proposed that NSS create a space art gallery to highlight the work of emerging space artists everywhere. The primary restriction is that all art must depict representations of either historical human space exploration or future human settlement of the solar system. That means no aliens, no monsters, no flying saucers, no bug-eyed monsters, and no planetary settings outside our solar system.

As the NSS Space Art Gallery curator it will be my job to review all submitted art to make sure it meets our guidelines for content and quality.

Why Should An Artist Participate?

There are several reasons why a space artist would want to participate in the National Space Society Space Art Gallery program.

1. Visibility. The National Space Society is in my opinion the best source of information about the human settlement of space on the Internet. People visit the NSS site to learn more about the human adventure in space. Joining the NSS Space Art Gallery can make the artist and their art a part of that adventure.
2. Search Engine Rank. NSS enjoys a rather high traffic rank so a link from the NSS site to the artist's personal site will improve the artist's standing in the Google rankings.
3. It's Free. There is no cost to the artist for joining and the artist maintains all rights to their art. Each participating artist will have a main gallery index page and a page for each of their artworks. Artist are free to provide wallpaper sized versions of their art if they want to make a larger version of their art available. The main page will include a brief bio of the artist, a link to the artist's web site, and a brief description of each work of art on exhibit.
4. Restricted Participation. Space in the art gallery will only be provided to those artists whose work is judged to be suitable based on quality and theme.

In summary I hope that both NSS and the participating artists will benefit from the Space Art Gallery concept. I also hope that the gallery will inspire other artists to venture into the space art arena.Two artists who have already been accepted into the program are Thomas Peters and David Robinson. Following are examples of their space art.

My goal is to have the NSS Space Art Gallery live by the end of July. If you are interested in participating in the NSS Space Art Gallery, please contact me. The easiest way to do that would be to leave a comment here that includes your name, email address, and web site url. Please note that I won't be publishing those comments that are requests for participation. However, comments that are feedback or questions regarding the program will be published.

The Illustration: Liftoff

Liftoff is a digital painting I recently completed. This particular painting is the result of an experiment in painting using a paint program I wrote. I have not yet added this painting to my Space Art Gallery but expect to do so in the near future.

| Return to the Blog Index | This entry was posted on Friday, July 17th, 2009 at 11:17 amand is filed under Space Art.

One Response to “A Space Art Gallery for NSS”

1. Jake Christensen says:

   Best of luck with this! As a space enthusiast with a creative background and an English Degree, it is awesome to see this project in the works.
   I love the samples you included in this post, especially the Falcon over Europa. I'm anxious to see us explore that moon further (and deeper).