In 1939 Frank R.Paul tried to imagine what life on other planets might look like. Given the limited information we had of each place, his imagination was free to fill in a lot of gaps.

Some pieces from artist Rik Allen’s wonderful blown glass Spacecraft Series 

From his artist statement:

Existence can be a myopic affair, focused on the immediate and the practical. We live our lives unaware of the true ways of the world. What lies beneath the surface of everyday? What collection of intricate quantum clockwork winds the mainspring of the universe? Those few that do gain access to those secrets – figures such as Nicola Tesla, Marie Curie, Albert Einstein – are isolated spelunkers into a vast hidden world, able with a single discovery, invention, or mode of thought, to pull back the veil of the visible and reveal in wondrous awe the true nature of Everything.

Rik Allen’s current body of work mines that rich vein between the outward mysteries of creation and the inward journeys of the human imagination. What began several years ago as an exploration of the iconic rocketship in its purest form has evolved into a contemplation of the role of individuals in our finite world, all in relation to the infinite complexity and vastness of the cosmos. We are each explorers on a journey through existence and Allen’s sculptures evoke this introspection and conveyance – spacecraft captained by lonely cartographers mapping the inky black seas between us all, organic vessel-creatures harbouring spores of complex knowledge bound for undiscovered mental landscapes, or sentient mechanical emissaries propagating our viral truths through the fabric of being.

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Atomic Overlook by Clay Lipsky

Lipsky on his work:

I was raised during the Cold War, when the threat of nuclear war loomed between two superpowers. The dramatized depictions in TV and film of such an apocalyptic demise both intrigued and scared me as a child. Yet the actual historic record of the atomic age was full of antiquated black and white images that seemed dated and a world away. This series recontextualizes a legacy of atomic tests in order to keep the reality of our post-atomic era fresh and omnipresent. It also speaks to the current state of the world and the voyeuristic culture that we live in. Imagine if the advent of the atomic era occurred during today’s information age. Tourists would gather to view the bomb tests, at the “safe” distances used in the 1950’s, and share the resulting cell phone photos online. Broadcast media would regurgitate such visual fodder ad nauseum, bringing new levels of desensitization. The threat of atomic weapons is as great as ever, but it is a hidden specter. Nuclear proliferation has gained even more obscurity through the “rogue” factions that can now possess them. Meanwhile America’s stockpile of weapons continues to be modernize and will probably never cease to exist. I can only hope that mankind will never again suffer the wrath of such a destructive force, but it is clear that the world would not hesitate to watch.

We were promised jetpacks seahorse riding. At least according to these illustrations of the 21st century done by artists at the turn of the 20th century.

About:

France in the Year 2000 (XXI century) – a series of futuristic pictures by Jean-Marc Côté and other artists issued in France in 1899, 1900, 1901 and 1910. Originally in the form of paper cards enclosed in cigarette/cigar boxes and, later, as postcards, the images depicted the world as it was imagined to be like in the year 2000. There are at least 87 cards known that were authored by various French artists, the first series being produced for the 1900 World Exhibition in Paris.

You can see them all here.

Miles Donovan’s Ulysses is based on a fictional missing space probe.

About the project/mission:

The Ulysses was designed to study the Sun as a joint venture between NASA and the European Space Agency. As part of the mission an encounter with Jupiter was scheduled to facilitate the major orbital plane shift required to study the Sun at all latitudes.

The mission ended on 30 June 2009 when it was determined scientists were unable to prevent the altitude control fuel from freezing and the probe was commanded to shut down transmission.

On 12 February 2011 between 15.35 and 20.20 UTC the Madrid Deep Space Network ground station picked up a series of short broadcasts thought to come from the Ulysses. It is believed that the probe’s radioisotope thermoelectric generator had momentarily restarted as it passed through the ion tail of Comet C/2011 S5.

The scrambled transmissions have been painstakingly pieced back together and are displayed here for the first time. NASA have not released information as to the whereabouts of the Ulysses when this broadcast occurred.

Julian Pacaud creates illustrations that somehow manage to appear both retro and futuristic at the same time. This may be explained by his bio:

I’m a french illustrator, currently living in Le Mans, France. Before becoming an illustrator, I was, by turns : an astrophysician, an international snooker player, a hypnotist and an esperanto teacher. I hope I can someday have enough free time to devote myself to my real passion : time travel.

Design Interactions Research asks the question:

What happens when you decouple design from the marketplace, when rather than making technology sexy, easy to use and more consumable, designers use the language of design to pose questions, inspire, and provoke — to transport our imaginations into parallel but possible worlds? Our research explores new ways design can make technology more meaningful and relevant to our lives, both now, and in the future, by thinking not only about new applications but implications as well.

One possible answer to this question they’ve explored is the 5th Dimensional Camera. What makes this camera different than any currently available cameras?

The 5th Dimensional Camera is a fictional device that captures glimpses of parallel universes suggested by quantum physics. How might we seek to interact with these other worlds? Would we become jealous of our parallel selves? What would happen to our sense of morality if we knew that we had committed inconceivable acts in another world?

Considering the progress being made in building quantum computers, the 5th Dimensional Camera might not remain purely fictional for much longer.

Today’s quiz: See if you can spot the historical inaccuracies in Matthew Buchholtz’s Alternate Histories

This series of beautifully designed classic Penguin books has an interesting theme:

Only God can create humans, and only humans can create monsters. 

The titles include R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots), The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, Frankenstein and The Island of Dr. Moreau. They were designed by Rachel Spoon.

Some very cool work by Brent Schoepf.