ARTWORK

ARTIST'S STATEMENT

I am a planetary scientist who loves to draw and paint. My artwork is about space and time, and our tiny yet hopeful place in their vastness. We live in a universe in which our existence seems happenstance, precarious, and with no obvious significance. Who are we? What are we? Why are we?

I depict in my drawings and paintings our past, events we've survived, our profound cosmic loneliness, and where we might go from here. Mars is the challenge of our time. Humans going to Mars will be the greatest adventure in space exploration this century. Beyond Mars, we should journey to Saturn's moon, Titan, and one day to the stars and deep into spacetime.

Although I am optimistic about our future in space and time, we face a daunting challenge in their exploration. Our spaceships are frail arks launching into an indifferent cosmic ocean. Spacesuits are covered in grit. Rovers break down. It's the engineering reality of our dream.

I have in my garage a primitive spacetime machine in which I can, at considerable risk, visit distant worlds and other epochs. My artwork is my travel log.

Pascal Lee