Monthly Archives: November 2011

To create his mesmerizing images of space, Michael Benson takes data from interplanetary probes by NASA and the European Space Agency, digitally enhances them, and spins them into photographs. It’s hard to know how much Benson is juicing his raw … Continued

The Solar System consists of the Sun and its planetary system of eight planets, their moons, and other non-stellar objects. It formed 4.6 billion years ago from the gravitational collapse of a giant molecular cloud. The vast majority of the system’s mass is in the … Continued

Human imagination has been soaring into the heavens for millions of years, but it wasn’t until 1961 that Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin actually left Earth’s atmosphere. Between 1969 and 1972 twelve Americans walked on the moon, but that’s as far … Continued

At the outset of both his new book, Planetfall, and his exhibition of the same title now at the Washington, D.C. headquarters of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, photographer Michael Benson defines the word “planetfall.” Planetfall, he states, is “the … Continued

Photographer Michael Benson was interested in space exploration as a child coming of age during the space race between the United States and the former Soviet Union. But, he didn’t pursue this interest until the 1990s, when he became fascinated … Continued