向歷史上默默無聞的女天文學家致敬

向歷史上默默無聞的女天文學家致敬

Artist Carol Prusa remembers looking out of her window at the night sky as a child and feeling the "overwhelming immensity" of space. Decades later, that same feeling still informs her art .

藝術家卡羅爾·普魯薩記得，她小時候從窗口望出去，看到夜空，感覺到了空間的“無邊無際”。幾十年后，同樣的感覺仍然影響著她的藝術。

Learning about the Big Bang in middle school was similarly influential, Prusa said, adding that she still meditates on the threshold between existing and not.

普魯薩說，在中學學習大爆炸也有類似的影響。她補充說，她仍然會在“存在”和“不存在”之間做冥想。

"I tried to envision what there was before there was something," she explained in an email interview. "Art, in its many forms, can... feel and express that vastness and the overwhelming fecundity of life. Looking at the night sky can leave one breathless by sheer scale and beauty and what we do not yet know."

她在接受電子郵件采訪時解釋說:“我試著去想象在事情發(fā)生之前會是什么樣子。”“藝術，以其多種形式，可以……感受并表達生命的博大精深。仰望夜空，規(guī)模之大、景色之美以及我們所不知道的事情都令人窒息。

Prusa's new show "Dark Light," which opens this week at Florida's Boca Raton Museum of Art, honors the pioneering work of female astronomers. Coming just weeks after the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, the exhibition also aims to explore the broader mysteries of the universe.

普魯薩的新展覽《黑暗之光》本周將在佛羅里達州的博卡拉頓藝術博物館開幕，它是為了紀念女性天文學家的開創(chuàng)性工作。此次展覽距離登月50周年僅幾周時間，目的還在于探索宇宙中更廣泛的奧秘。

Prusa encountered female astronomers as she delved into books about dark matter and eclipses. In particular, she cites Vera Rubin, an astrophysicist credited with helping prove the existence of dark matter, and Maria Mitchell, the first American woman to work as a professional astronomer.

普魯薩在鉆研有關暗物質(zhì)和日食的書籍時遇到了女天文學家。她特別引用了薇拉·魯賓和瑪麗亞·米切爾的例子。魯賓是一位天體物理學家，被認為幫助證明了暗物質(zhì)的存在。米切爾是第一位從事專業(yè)天文學家工作的美國女性。

Mitchell's journals detailed her experience of taking a team of female astronomers to Denver, Colorado, to witness a rare total solar eclipse in 1878.

米切爾的日記詳細描述了她帶領一組女天文學家前往科羅拉多州丹佛市，親眼目睹1878年罕見的日全食的經(jīng)歷。

"Seeing a total eclipse for the first time, I was blown away by a euphoric feeling . I was so moved that I literally fell backward," said Prusa, who watched the event from the banks of the North Platte River in Nebraska. "When the shadow of the eclipse passed over, the world changed in a way I had never experienced before.

“第一次看到日全食，我被一種愉悅感所震撼。我太感動了，簡直要倒了下去，”普魯薩說，她在內(nèi)布拉斯加州的北普拉特河岸邊觀看了這一現(xiàn)象。“當日食的陰影過去后，世界發(fā)生了我從未經(jīng)歷過的變化。

While Prusa's earlier work played with similar shades of gray, her new series -- rooted in the eclipse -- focuses on the contrast between light and dark tones. She created her striking palette by grinding stainless steel, iron oxide and graphite into painting materials. The end result is multiple domes and circular artworks representing various stages of a total solar eclipse.

雖然普魯薩的早期作品也使用了類似的灰色色調(diào)，但她的新系列——植根于《月食》——關注的是明暗色調(diào)的對比。她將不銹鋼、氧化鐵和石墨研磨成繪畫材料，創(chuàng)造出了自己引人注目的調(diào)色板。最終的結(jié)果是多個穹頂和圓形藝術品，代表了日全食的不同階段。

"Black, no matter how dark, still reflects light. I wanted to make black have depth and structure, and to be infinite," Prusa said. "The eclipses influenced me in this respect, but this could also be a reflection on the times we live in. There isn't dark without light -- or light without dark."

黑色，不管有多暗，仍然會反射光線。我想讓黑色具有深度和結(jié)構，并且是無限的，”普魯薩說。“日食在這方面影響了我，但這也可能是我們所生活的時代的反映。沒有光就沒有黑暗，沒有黑暗就沒有光明。”