Astronautics owes much of its existence to the arts. On the one hand, literary works by authors such as Jules Verne (1828-1905) were directly responsible for inspiring the founders of modern spaceflight; on the other hand, artists such as Chesley Bonestell (1888-1986)^* made spaceflight seem possible. When Bonestell's space art was first published in the 1940s and early 1950s, spaceflight to most people still belonged in the realm of comic books and pulp fiction. Bonestell, working with such great space scientists as Wernher von Braun, depicted space travel with such vivid reality that it suddenly no longer seemed so fantastic. Emerging as it did when the United States was first taking an interest in astronautics, these paintings went a long way toward encouraging both public and government support.

Space Art Comes of Age

Since Bonestell's time, there have been many other artists who have specialized in space art...