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Reading Nature, Observing Science: Examining Material Practices in the Lick Observatory Archives and Kenneth S. Norris Papers

Case 5: Illustrating the Cosmos

The images on the top shelf of case 5 display a selection of astronomical illustrations from the Lick Observatory archives. Notably, the archives contain sketches and correspondence from famous astronomical illustrator Étienne Trouvelot. Did the ideas and images offered by artists like Trouvelot have an impact on the way astronomers at the Lick perceived the cosmos? Can astronomical observation be purely objective, freed from aesthetic experience and aesthetic expectations? Click the above link to read more.

Our research in the Lick Observatory archives has uncovered correspondence and sketches from Étienne Trouvelot, a French artist and astronomer known for his whimsical illustrations of celestial objects. Trouvelot worked with the Lick Observatory's first director, Edward S. Holden, at the U.S. Naval Observatory while Holden was a professor of astronomy there. It seems they continued to communicate throughout Holden's tenure at the Lick.

As an artist and a scientist, Trouvelot occupies an interesting position within the nineteenth-century discussion of objectivity. In one letter to Holden, not displayed here, he suggests that a good observer must possess both "fire and ice." It seems that for Trouvelot, interfacing with the cosmos was both an aesthetic experience and an act of cool judgement; we can perhaps sense this tension between sensation and sensibility in his illustrations, two of which are displayed in this exhibition. In another letter, displayed here, he urges Holden to consider the capacities of the eye and the advantages of observing the cosmos directly through the telescope, rather than relying secondarily on the images produced by the camera.

An oversized set of prints of Trouvelot's drawings (approximately 2' by 3') was gifted to the Lick Observatory. These prints are accessible through UCSC Special Collections, or they can be viewed online through the digital collections of the New York Public Library.

The archives also contain several illustrations created by astronomers at the Lick Observatory. Displayed here are visual materials created by Holden, James Keeler, and James Schaeberle, as well as images collected in the archives from astronomers at other observatories. Additionally, on display in Case 3: In Relation to Nature are personal scrapbooks and copybooks, in which Lick astronomers recorded their observations both numerically and pictorially, using sketches, light distribution charts, and even vividly descriptive notes alongside measurement logs.

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Contents of this path:
1. Case 5: Illustrating the Cosmos The images on the top shelf of case 5 display a selection of astronomical illustrations from the Lick Observatory archives. Notably, the archives contain sketches and correspondence from famous astronomical illustrator Étienne Trouvelot. Did the ideas and images offered by artists like Trouvelot have an impact on the way astronomers at the Lick perceived the cosmos? Can astronomical observation be purely objective, freed from aesthetic experience and aesthetic expectations? Click the above link to read more.
Contents of this path:
4. Case 5: Illustrating the Cosmos The images on the top shelf of case 5 display a selection of astronomical illustrations from the Lick Observatory archives. Notably, the archives contain sketches and correspondence from famous astronomical illustrator Étienne Trouvelot. Did the ideas and images offered by artists like Trouvelot have an impact on the way astronomers at the Lick perceived the cosmos? Can astronomical observation be purely objective, freed from aesthetic experience and aesthetic expectations? Click the above link to read more.
5. Case 5: Photographing and Printing the Cosmos The middle and bottom shelves of case 5 display documents, images, and objects related to the early astrophotographic work of the Lick Observatory. Is it possible to obtain "objective" representations of celestial objects like galaxies and nebula when their details are invisible even in the telescope? How were Lick astronomers' ideas about the objectivity of the camera filtered through the aesthetic concern to produce visually stunning photographs? How is our idea of the reality of the cosmos--then, as now--a matter of aesthetic expectations created by certain standards and conventions of representation? Click the above link to read more.

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In the book, Trouvelot writes, "Those unacquainted with the use of optical instruments generally suppose that all astronomical drawings are obtained by the photographic process, and are, therefore, comparatively easy to procure; but this is not true. Although photography renders valuable assistance to the astronomer in the case of the Sun and Moon, as proved by the fine photographs of these objects taken by M. Janssen and Mr. Rutherfurd ; yet, for other subjects, its products are in general so blurred and indistinct that no details of any great value can be secured. A well-trained eye alone is capable of seizing the delicate details of structure and of configuration of the heavenly bodies, which are liable to be affected, and even rendered invisible, by the slightest changes in our atmosphere."