Chesley Bonestell (American, 1888-1986). Space Station Under Construction, Sunday Mirror Magazine interior

Description

Chesley Bonestell (American, 1888-1986)
Space Station Under Construction, Sunday Mirror Magazine interior, June 19, 1949
Oil on board
18-3/4 x 27-1/2 inches (47.6 x 69.8 cm)
Signed lower left: Chesley Bonestell

The Bob and Diane Yaspan Collection

Chesley Bonestell's Space Station Under Construction was first published in the Sunday Mirror Magazine supplement to the New York Sunday Mirror on June 19, 1949. Appearing just four years after the end of World War II, as the global imagination was becoming fascinated the promise of space exploration, the work is visionary example of his groundbreaking space art. Depicting astronauts assembling an enormous orbital station against the curve of the Earth, with remarkable attention to the design of space suits, docking ships, and engineering structures, Bonestell's accuracy was striking for the time. The artist's details proved prophetic and perhaps inspirational to the look and feel of early space travel. At once optimistic and technically grounded, Bonestell captured the sense that space was not a distant dream but a looming reality, foreshadowing the technological competition of the coming space race.

Space Station Under Construction was later featured as part of the 2003 retrospective volume The Chesley Awards for Science Fiction & Fantasy Art and used on the front and back cover of Skylife: Space Habitats in Story and Space featuring Arthur C. Clarke, Ray Bradbury, and Isaac Asimov, testament to its enduring awe-inspiring power.

The work is also reproduced on pages 134-135 of The Art of Chesley Bonestell by Ron Miller and Frederick C. Durant III with Melvin H. Schuetz (Paper Tiger, 2001).


Estimate: $20,000 - up.

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