Uncalibrated: Drawing, Photography and the Raw Images of Astronomy

This practice research responds to the raw images from the Cassini space mission to Saturn, a collection of nearly 400,000 unprocessed digital photographs captured by the cameras onboard the Cassini probe. These sources are explored through a contemporary art practice with a multimedia approach to drawing. Through the development of a body of artistic work, the research explores the possibility of new outlooks on the association between Saturn and melancholy grounded in contemporary concerns and practices.

The research develops ‘drawing with’ as an artistic methodology to articulate the relationship between the artist, materials and processes. Elaborating on bricolage-inspired models, ‘drawing with’ brings together various ideas from recent critical thinking and consolidates them through drawing practice. This model is shaped by the creative work exploring drawing’s relationship with digitality and digital image-processing technologies. The research rehabilitates the digital photo mosaic as a digital drawing method.