First-Ever Space Selfie, Unpublished Images From Moon Landing, Head To Auction
To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the last time humans landed on the Moon, Los Angeles Modern Auctions (LAMA) has teamed up with Wright auction house for a special collection.
The sale, entitled One Giant Leap for Mankind: Vintage Photographs from the Victor Martin-Malburet Collection, will offer space fanatics the chance to snag over 300 original historic images from Project Apollo.
The pictures—many of which have never been published—have been specially researched and collected over the last two and a half decades by Victor Martin-Malburet, depicting one of the greatest ever instances in human exploration and technology.
Your selfies will never be as epic as this one:
— Marina Amaral (@marinamaral2) January 14, 2021
Buzz Aldrin, first-ever space selfie.
From Gemini 12, 1966. pic.twitter.com/t7jXVnUq8Q
In fact, lots up for grabs include the only image Neil Armstrong on the Moon’s surface, a rare print of the most reproduced photo in human history The Blue Marble, and even the first-ever selfie captured in space.
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According to the website, the astronauts part of the Apollo mission were given sophisticated cameras designed by Kodak, Hasselblad, and Zeiss to capture images in orbit, with NASA Chief of Photography Richard Underwood telling them the “key to immortality is in the quality of the photograph and nothing else.”
“The [Apollo] astronauts are often presented as great scientists and heroes, but rarely are they hailed as some of the most significant photographers of all time. From the unknown, they brought back a new visual vocabulary. Through them, art broke free of gravity,” said Martin-Malburet.
The historic documents went up for auction on October 28, with prices ranging from US$800 to US$50,000. Head here for more information.
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[via Robb Report and Wright Auction House, cover image via NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center / Image courtesy of NASA]
