Constellatory

"Constellatory" in Fabricated Aluminum in 2017 by Rebecca Di Domenico on the Pearl St Mall.  

It lights up at night.

The stars are so far away that their light has taken millions of years to reach us.  Almost all cultures in the world have projected images and stories onto the starry heavens, hence the name, “Constellatory”.  We utilize stars to tell stories.  We wish upon the stars.  We use the stars to navigate our way.  Stars remind us of the infinite, something mysterious deep inside our own selves.  Many cultures have Gods or Goddesses to represent the stars.  Nut, the Egyptian Goddess of the night, gave birth to the stars.  Aphrodite was the Goddess of the morning star, the evening star and the mysteries of dreams, death and regeneration.  She held up a kind of divine map of the heavenly bodies, the cosmic web of the stars.  One definition of a disk is a flat plate coated with a magnetic substance on which data is stored. The disk, as a modern tool, in addition to storing data, connecting individuals, stories and dreams through the information age.  A disk is a multifarious symbol of the universe, a circular shape laminating the heavens like a celestial body moving out in the fabric of space and time.  The story of the interconnected stars is the inspiration behind this installation.

DiDomenico constructed this 5’ diameter constellation disk, featuring many familiar constellations (Leo, Scorpio, Big Dipper, Lyre, Altar, Orion, Dolphin, Arrow, Southern Fish, Northern Crown, Reticulum, and Big Dog).