Fallen Astronaut
Fallen Astronaut (literally the “fallen Astronaut”) is a sculpture in Aluminum representative in a stylized way a Astronaute in his space behavior. This statuette, which measures approximately: 8.5 cm in height, are the single work of art being on the the Moon.
The sculpture was carried out by the Belgian artist Paul Van Hoeydonck, which had met the astronaut David Scott at the time of a dinner. It had been requested from Van Hoeydonck to create a small statuette which would be useful within the framework of the personal commemoration of the astronauts and cosmonauts died for and during the space conquest. A certain number of instructions had been given to the artist: the scuplture was to be light, solid, able to support the extreme temperature variations of lunar surface, it was not to make it possible to identify in it a man or a woman, nor even no ethnicity. Moreover, in agreement with the wish of Scott to avoid a marketing of space, the name of Van Hoeydonck would not be revealed with the public.
Fallen Astronaut was deposited on the Moon by the crew of Apollo 15, at the sides of a plate bearing the names of eight American astronauts and six Soviet cosmonauts, died during space flights or at the time of exercises of drive:
- Theodore Freeman (October 31st, 1964, air crash)
- Charlie Bassett (February 28th, 1966, air crash)
- Elliott See (February 28th, 1966, air crash)
- Virgil Grissom (January 27th, 1967, fire of the capsule Apollo 1)
- Roger Chaffee (January 27th, 1967, fire of the capsule Apollo 1)
- Edward White (January 27th, 1967, fire of the capsule Apollo 1)
- Vladimir Komarov (April 24th, 1967, put out of torch of the parachutes of the capsule Soyuz 1)
- Edward Givens (June 6th, 1967, car accident)
- Clifton Williams (October 5th, 1967, air crash)
- Youri Gagarine (March 27th, 1968, air crash)
- Pavel Belyayev (January 10th, 1970, disease)
- Georgi Dobrovolski (June 30th, 1971, accidental depressurization of the capsule Soyuz 11)
- Viktor Patsayev (June 30th, 1971, accidental depressurization of the capsule Soyuz 11)
- Vladislav Volkov (June 30th, 1971, accidental depressurization of the capsule Soyuz 11)
As soon as the crew had mentioned the statuette during their press conference of after-flight, the National Air and Space Museum claimed a copy of it to expose it in public. The crew accepted under the reserve that this exhibition was “ with good taste and without publicity ” (i.e. of good taste and without publicity). The counterpart of Fallen Astronaut was presented by Van Hoeydonck to the museum in April 1972. This counterpart is exposed today with a counterpart of the commemorative plaque.
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