Carte photographique de la lune, planche V.A (Photographic Chart of the Moon, plate V.A) Possibly 1900 - 1914

Charles Le Morvan’s “Photographic Chart of the Moon” is made using a photographic process; he captures the moon, transforming light into something we can see and touch. It’s as if the moon itself is a painter, etching its own face onto the photographic plate. The surface of the moon is like a canvas, a playground of light and shadow. Look at the craters, how they’re not just holes, but records of cosmic events, each impact a brushstroke in the moon’s ongoing self-portrait. I bet Le Morvan felt like he was wrestling with the cosmos itself trying to capture this image. I imagine him in a darkened room, bathed in the eerie glow of the developing image. Thinking about the photographs of the moon by people like Nasmyth or De la Rue, this one is made with a scientific purpose. But I can see poetry in the image itself, a reminder that art and science are just different ways of looking, and how each one informs the other.