Mars

Text by Noel Cramer from:
"The Art of Ludek Pesek"

The artist was particularly fascinated by the planet Mars. One of his science fiction novels (The Earth is near) was based on a first exploration of that planet. The topographic data acquired by spacecraft in the seventies made possible a good estimate of land features - landscapes as they would appear to an astronaut walking on the Martian surface. In the Mars Section we present some of Ludek Pesek's best known paintings done after the first results of the Viking landers became available in 1976. These images are followed by some corresponding pages from the artist's sketchbook where he pasted the photograph of a portion of the finished work. All the Martian landscapes are oil-painted on boards measuring either 57 x 86 cm or 61x 90 cm. Also included are six earlier paintings which show the dark blue sky as it was anticipated before the Viking spacecraft sent back their first images from their landing sites. We may point out that, apart from the rendering of the sky, these paintings are in good agreement with our present knowledge of the Martian environment.

View from Deimos
(Courtesy Smithsonian Institution)