How the body of the Earth was transformed into a cosmic art gallery
I wanted monopetra.art not to be some boring website, but to be enveloped in real history, imbued with adventure and emotion, ineffable and boiling over. Like falling in love, passionate and unchained, in which you’re simultaneously liberated and enslaved. When you’re being tugged, yet are yourself tempestuous. When you’re the foam of the frothing sea neath which are hid the cold, the blue, and the sea salt. I felt it through the droplets that clung to my mustache, which related their excitement like Morse code. I solved it, I believe. On those Greek isles bordering the feeling of paradise and solitude I was summoned to cultivate new longings. To do that which I find truly intoxicating.
I may be mad for dreaming of setting foot upon the Moon, but that is what I did. With my avant-garde art conquest of the lunar surface. I haunt its bright side every full Moon, howling with insomnia and thoughts. But its dark side – she’s like a part of me. From her surges fourth all my frothing inspiration.
For that reason, my first exhibition was in the Jack Parsons Crater, digging the far side of the Moon. Its uneven surface, resembling an amoeba under microscope, hosted my creations, adopted and absorbed them in its lunar skin. An exhibition on the moon – what a lunatic notion, and yet, it was worth conquering through my dream that almost virginal surface, only voyeuristically observed by a stronger telescope. And yes, I’ve met with lunatics who asked: “How did you send your art there, on the surface of the Moon?”, that even I believed myself, that the exhibition with my art pieces is hanging there still, above our heads. The photographs around the event were infused with enormous energy, while the heavy breathing of the workers who assisted in the arrangement of the sculptures felt like in an environment bereft pressure or oxygen. To some folks dreams a but a drudgery.
The moon in antiquity
I heard all manner of theories about the moon, but for me, as an artist of the visual, the most important question is when across the ages did it first appear as a symbol. It would be pragmatic and logical for it to have first appeared in the oldest lunar calendar ever created, the one discovered on the walls of the famous pre-historic caves of Lascaux – France. It’s dated back to 15 thousand B.C. I’m not a historian or a student of the moon’s uses but that’s exactly its utilitarian application. A way of keeping the time. Cycles. Change. Motion.
Of other works on the moon
When I made my intention of having an exhibition on the lunar surface public, internet generously stayed silent on the fact that I wasn’t the first artist and art connoisseur to have seized the surface of Earth’s satellite. An internet silence on the existence of art cosmic ancestors. A black hole. With time there appeared articles about my colleagues who had already sent their works to the Moon. One of whom, I found out, was the Belgian-American artist Paul Van Hoeydonck. The idea hadn’t been his exactly, and he had found it so absurd that he hardly could have believed it when an astronaut of “Apollo 15” places by the lunar rover a small figurine, one of the artist’s own make, later dubbed “The Fallen Astronaut”. God, it hadn’t been so much art, as it was a memorial plaque, if only 8 centimeters in stature, of those who had fallen during the space missions.
Another object of curiosity is the American sculptor Forrest Myers, who is thought to have sent works of a whole myriad of famous artists to the lunar surface in a personally designed capsule-gallery. Andy Warhol is believed to have contributed a painting of a penis, as part of this exhibition. Genitals in space. The topic. I jest, yet it is an idea for a future exhibit.
Nowadays, a year prior to me finishing the second part of my project on the Moon, Jeff Koons also decided on sending his works there, so as to start his advertisement campaign about the sales of NFTs. This makes me happy, as some far more famous and more lucrative colleague has decided to use my gallery, a year after myself. I wish him good luck and for him to meet a muse in this endeavour, one who will elevate him beyond the allure of money, because, for me at least, the exhibition on the Moon was and will always be a spiritual experience. More about his project can be read (here)
Of new and old friends
My moon project acquainted me with new friends, of whom I lost none with time. We have a friendly full Moon, not the clean slate of the new Moon. We spoke much on the nature of the Moon and why it circled around the Earth, that we weren’t physicist, astronomers or other specialists never bothered us. We were free to have our concepts and theories which were often avant-garde and artistic and sometimes even paranoid and nonsensical. With the start of the lunar exhibit also began my own cosmic renaissance and an unstoppable drive for conquest and adventure. I could see in the eyes of my interlocutors the longing and drive to fly with me. To the Moon and back again. And for them to prove to themselves that there were no impossible tasks, that not even the Earth’s pull could ground them for long. For their desire to shoot off, fly, and leave themselves to this bliss – complete weightlessness, is all consuming. How can the ordinary, earthly, visible hold you down when your soul yearns to fly up high to the Moon? There’s just no way!
In our sweet talks, ceasing only with the bright of dawn, we talked of her. The Moon. She was a construct, a holographic image – unreachable and terrifying in her gray mercurial surface. Other times we thought of a world of high reason, from which we are observed and guarded from our own self-destructive human nature and our rapacious desire to use up to completion. Occasionally we saw it as a transit station where a long queue of souls would wait to be directed to place in the infinite cosmos. So as not to be lost. The Moon – an important stop for them to find each other, to find direction, and who knows what else awaits them on their journey. These talks opened an unknown world to me, a hand fan of possibility, parallel dimensions. The also burdened me with responsibility to create something truly impressive to kiss the Moon. It would have been a collection of sculptures, which I could call my space project. I felt like an explorer. A missionary.
And I think I succeeded. The first “landing” of my works was a triumph. Unlike anything seen until now. Neither in NASA, nor in the reports form the space missions. I patented a new vison of the Moon, of space. I fashioned my own cosmogony, brimming with the symbolism and metaphor, encoded in my sculptures. I sent the human to the moon, despite the Moon sending itself to humanity each night.
Of conspiracies
Like all who’ve started their own lunar project, I also encountered sceptics and non-believers, who doubt the seven landings of American astronauts upon the Moon. They dared take away the American dream and the victory over the Russians in their race for space dunks. I admit, they did manage to infect me with their skepticism and conspiracy theories. I went through a crucial moment – I was at the brink of giving up on the exposition, for I fell into the clutches of people, for whom the conspiracy, surrounding these voyages, was of greater importance than all else.
I had already finished drawing on several old bed springs, the bronze on their surface would playfully glimmer through the fenestrated surface. My fantasy of new lunar visages in ethereal springs and bronze were to hell. I needed the hard proof that those from NASA had been there. That what show us is really from the surface of the Moon. That it is distant, but reachable. That the human dream does not stop at dreaming, but there, somewhere, piercing through the leaves of gravity, in the infinity of the cosmos, until it hits the craterous surface of the albescent Moon. I was drowning in the arguments of conspirators about the conspicuously waving American flag – impossible on the Moon, the lack of stars, as well as other nonsense about the length and direction of the shadows, detected by keen-eyed sceptics on the evidence of voyages to Earth’s satellite. Yet I found them no longer exciting. The landing was one thing, flawless and unnoticeable, another – its advertisement. It was clear that the shots were embellished for greater effect. Who would have paid them attention, amidst the colourful adverts that cleft in twain one’s beloved soap opera?
The most logical defense of the American landings came to me from Alexei Leonov for whom it was fully obvious why some shots of the moon were taken on the Earth. “Well, for greater dramatics”, he said, “the fact is, Americans love Hollywood and Hollywood loves America, and with no drama, there’s no landings”.
Whichever way we look at it, it’s clear that with all the expenses for going to the Moon, what’s left for America to draw is solely political dividends in the race with Russia. They wanted to land there first and they did just that, one way or another. A bit of advertising and splitting of the East’s ears couldn’t hurt. Among the conspirators it’s told like a joke, that in fact these famous landings have a connection to the extension of the agony of communism, for Russia had noticed the deceit and for new technologies and greater funding had sold its silence and congratulations to America, with which it would upkeep its failing obscurantist system, that had taken the lives of so many people. After the invasion of Ukraine this argument would forever remain a joke, for you must agree that, had there been a conspiracy here, Russia would definitely have utilized such compromising material. At least, right now it would. Another thing is that the PRs at NASA must all be fired, for with the commotion they are making about the new mission Artemis of Jeff Bezos, people are left with the impression that NASA and the rich American of Greek descent will be the first to visit the Moon. The nonsensical notion that they have yet to study cosmic radiation further fuels conspiracy theories in light of the fact that we already have two Mars Rovers that should have long provided this information to NASA headquarters. The comedy that was the astronaut’s costumes I won’t even speak of, for there is no way that the materials of the sixties were more reliable than those of today. They may have lost the technology for their creation. Or it could have been stolen by Martians. Or moon people.
This is where I end this topic, because with each criticism of the past or presents, I downplay the feat of those 12 tough men and their helpers, as on Earth, so in space, who at great risk to their own lives went on missions to show us that the impossible is possible.
My lunar NFT series can be found (here)
I will try to keep the site monopetra.art away from commercial trappings, for its purpose is different. To popularize my art in this dynamic virtual world. Internet space is still too young to bear the colossal winnings I wait the site to produce. I am releasing some of my works under the form of NFT at absolutely symbolic prices, not so much to gain profit but to popularize my lunar exhibition through another medium. Internet is a still in its infancy and its growth is reached only through enormous creative advancement, comparable to that of the Renaissance. The great aim before every artist is not to enrich the web with their works, but to make the Internet their own work of art, because I am talking about a new virtual world, which is yet to live through its visual Renaissance. Those of you who understand these words of mine, possess the resources as well as the technical toolbox and skills, can write me (here).
The first exhibition on the moon, and the second which is yet to come
The sculptures themselves, created from bed springs, painted with molten metal, had no need of this lunar adventure, but I admit that they stood so well in this project, that the moon definitely enhanced the effect I sought, plus they’ll be left as a message from humanity to space. Anyway, I did not expect any major sensation around this project, but with true friends who liked the initial presentation, purchased and still do my works, I can manage to collect enough resources for a second blast off into space. I admit, Earth is a little cramped for me.
Lastly, the main works which were and will be shown on the Moon.
Sculpture of love
Love is that which makes us human. That for which I want my sculptures to visit the Moon. Look, since I’ve started to work on the idea of realizing this exhibition, I feel elated daily. The thought that I can present my works on another body in space, is unlike anything I’ve known as a feeling, but if I have to give an example of a similar feeling, without a doubt I would say love.
Death
For there exists bodily death, but the soul is immortal and has its own universal tracks, but I don’t plan on divulging into the philosophy of the theme in the presence of so many beliefs.
Sacrifice
Our daily sacrifice to whatever you can think of has long been depriving this sacred deed of its holiness and has debased it to a degree which you’ll not like if I delve into the topic. I do not intend to refrain from this act, given to us by the gods to serve and understand them, which we have torn down to a level that we sacrifice each other in order to to surround ourselves with comforts.
The wheel
The wheel is time which spins and repeats. The one thing that changes is the material on which it is depicted to remain longer in motion.
The Compass
The compass is for my captain-friend Georges, who gets himself in incredibel nonsense, but is a tough bastard and always finds his way, like a true captain to live free a while.
Sculpture of the tongue
This is Babylon, Babylon with its many eyes. This sculpture is dedicated to those who see, but cannot speak of the seen. The first five minutes, in which humanity had its languages switched around and looks around terrified, placing the new words into its brain. I have a painting from 1992, which I’ve always wanted to sculpt.
Androgyny
In earthly nature there exists androgyny, let’s not argue on the matter, but it’s fun to argue whether such beings exist in the wider universe.
During the second lunar art voyage, you’ll become witnesses to new sculptures like Artificial intelligence, The Clown, and others.
UNFINISHED!
