NASA announced the opening of a free new art exhibit inspired by the James Webb Space Telescope at the Visitor Center at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The public opening begins March 3 and runs for six weeks. Members of the Media are invited to a preview at 1 p.m. EST on March 2.
In November 2016, artists from around the country applied to visit NASA Goddard to see the telescope, with its 6.5-meter-high, gold-coated mirror. Twenty five were selected to bring art supplies with them and be inspired to create in front of Webb, housed inside its massive cleanroom behind a viewing window. The artists represented a broad range of artistic media and styles, including watercolor, 3D printed sculpture, silk screening, acrylics, sumi-e (East Asian brush technique), comics, letterpress, woodwork, metalwork, jewelry making, fiber art, ink, mural painting, kite-making, tattooing, scientific illustration, poetry, songwriting and video.
Visitors can view an exhibit of the resulting artwork at the Goddard Visitor Center from March 3 to April 16, 2017. There is no entry fee for the Visitor’s Center, which is open to the general public.
The Webb telescope, a joint mission between NASA, the European Space Agency and Canadian Space Agency, will study every phase in the history of our Universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of planetary systems capable of supporting life on planets like Earth, to the evolution of our own Solar System and beyond.
View a gallery of the art: https://jwst.nasa.gov/jwstArt/
For more information about NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, visit: www.nasa.gov/webb or jwst.nasa.gov
For directions to the NASA Goddard visitor’s center: https://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/visitor/directions/index.html
Laura Betz / Rob Gutro
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
301-286-9030 / 4044
Robert.j.gutro@nasa.gov / Laura.e.betz@nasa.gov