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The Bell Museum's Year of Apollo celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing continues with a showcase Museum of the Moon, by UK artist Luke Jerram. Our installation also coincides with the anniversary of NASA's Apollo 10 mission that orbited the Moon May 18-26, 1969, the "dress rehearsal" for the first Moon landing.
The seven meter spherical sculpture of Earth's Moon is a fusion of NASA imagery, simulated moonlight and surround sound composition created by BAFTA and Ivor Novello award winning composer Dan Jones. At an approximate scale of 1:500,000, each centimeter of the internally lit sphere represents five kilometers of the lunar surface. Museum of the Moon will be suspended from the ceiling in Horizon Hall and have only a few feet between it and the floor. The artwork will technically be on view day and night thanks to floor-to-ceiling windows that flank the north and south ends of the museum’s large lobby.
The massive 21 meter wide, high resolution image used for the sculpture was created by the USGS Astrogeology Science Center in Flagstaff, Arizona. The imagery was taken by a NASA satellite carrying the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera launched in 2010. Museum of the Moon has brought moonlit inspiration to over three million people in over 25 cities around the world.
Now, Minnesota’s mission to the Moon is go for launch!