Space Mission
Apollo 11, 16-24 July 1969
Exhibition(s)
La Lune: Du Voyage Réel aux Voyages Imaginaires, Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, exhibition catalog, ppg. 28-29, no. 21 illustrates this work
Photographer
Neil Armstrong
Photo Description
Vintage chromogenic print on resin-coated Kodak paper
10 h × 8 w in (25 × 20 cm); Stamped to verso ‘PR 69093’ with ‘A Kodak Paper’ watermarks.
[NASA image AS11-40-5931]
Essay
As Buzz Aldrin was removing scientific equipment from Eagle, Neil Armstrong backed away 20 meters southeast from the LM to frame this magnificent shot, part of a full 360° panoramic sequence showing Tranquility Base.
The TV camera and Solar Wind Collector are in the right foreground. Footprints made by the first moonwalkers and the 35mm stereo close-up Kodak camera are in the foreground. The two astronauts and their spacecraft were the first visitors of this previously untouched world.
“Our LM was sitting there with its black, silver and bright yellow orange thermal coating shining brightly in the otherwise colorless landscape. I had seen Neil in his suit thousands of times before, but on the Moon the unnatural whiteness of it seemed unusually brilliant.”
—Buzz Aldrin (NASA SP-350, pg. 11.5)