This diptych combines two images. One of the region of space where Voyager was when it entered inter-stellar space and one of the migration routes from Africa to the Canary Islands, taken at night by the Suomi NPP sattelite (part of the
Black Marble photograph). Together they appear to form one continuous starfield.
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| Migration and Memory Diptych, 2013 |
In October 2012 in the first
stage of the From the Island project, Andrews and Verdugo travelled from
London to the Roche de Los Muchachos Observatories on the Island of Santa Cruz
de la Palma in the Canary Islands. They
were granted permission to use the Nordic Optical Telescope to take a
photograph of the region of space where, somewhere in the blackness between the
stars, the tiny space probe makes its momentous journey –taking mankind out of
the confines of the solar system for the first time. This is the first time
artists have used the telescope to take such a photograph. It’s a testament to the management of the
observatory to allocate this precious time to help to document a very special
stage in man’s journey.
As Andrews and Verdugo took the
photograph in La Palma the Suomi NPP satellite passed over head. In its mission it orbits the Earth 14 times a
day using its camera to take incredible photographs of light from the
planet. From an altitude of 500
kilometers it’s able to capture the light from isolated fishing boats as well
as the intense light from the cities. In this region of the world the bright
lights of the Canary Islands show strongly against the relative darkness of
Africa. As with the Voyager somewhere in
the darkness between the lights are thousands of migrants making journeys
towards the brightly lit cities of Europe.
