Everyday Moons
Everyday Moons is a series of three 3D animated videos that brings us to the orbits of Earth, Mars, and Uranus, where hypothetical new ‘sculpture-moons’ have been created for different planets in the solar system: for Earth, a moon of porcelain coffee cups; for Mars, a moon of strawberries; and for Uranus, a moon of wool socks.
The imagery in the videos was developed in collaboration with Dr. Charles H. Lineweaver, a professor at the Australian National University's Planetary Science Institute (PSI). Working together, we speculated what a landscape on each of these moons might look like—for example, how big can the mountains be on a moon of socks at a specific diameter? Or, what sort of atmosphere would a moon of strawberries need in order to keep them from freezing instantly in space?
The videos visualize the phenomenon of gravitational collapse—the contraction of an astronomical object due to the influence of its own gravity, which tends to draw matter inward toward the center of gravity. In other words, it is that which makes things spherical in space. Smaller bodies such as asteroids and comets are often irregular shapes, because their mass is not large enough for gravity to overtake other binding forces of their material. But as the mass of a body becomes larger, there is a specific point for every element when gravity takes over and begins to pull it into a sphere. It can be seen here on Earth: when walking along a mountainside and dirt or stones roll down a hill, it can be thought of as the Earth becoming a just a bit more spherical.
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Strawberry Moon
2021
3D animation
2m 55s loop
Teaser:
Installation:
Stills:
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Wool Sock Moon
2021
3D animation
3m 00s loop
Teaser:
Installation:
Stills:
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Porcelain Cup Moon
2018
3D animation
3m 14s loop
Teaser:
Installation:
Porcelain Cup Moon stills:
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PRESS
Morgenbladet / “Et univers av ting” by Espen Hauglid / Click here for a PDF
Kunstkritikk / “Sightseeing på månen“ by Eirik Zeiner-Henriksen
Kunstavisen / “Overhodet ikke hverdagslig” by Mona Gjessing
Project supported by Norwegian Visual Artists Fund (Billedkunstnernes Vederlagsfond, NBK)