It’s another edition of The Space Age Craze, and today’s article continues a series arc on the use of art to promote the draw of Spaceflight and Space Exploration. Today’s article covers the space themed oil paintings of Cathrin Machin, an artist from Sydney, Australia who has had a long passion for the wonders of Space.
Artist Cathrin Machin
Cathrin Machin, has made a notable career with her original space-themed artwork. Born in West Midlands, England, she learned to love oil painting from her father who took up oil painting.
Artist Cathrin Machin with one of her paintings
Cathrin would spend Saturday evenings with her mother watching various science programs and documentaries, fueling her passion for all things scientific. (NOTE: Saturday evenings are a great time for this. I used to watch NOVA and Owl TV on PBS on Saturday nights as a boy. Good times!).
Eye Nebula – Cathrin Machin
She continued to hone her abilities into her teen years, and ultimately went to Trinity Art College to study art and graphic design, but also studied mathematics, and physics. Her favorite physics subjects, per her Facebook biography are Astrophysics and Quantum Physics.
Galactic Dust Cloud – Cathrin Machin
She then studied mechanical engineering at Loughborough University before moving on to the video games industry. (NOTE: As an avid Star Trek Online player myself, I have a great appreciation for what she and others do for video games).
Blue Quasar – Cathrin Machin
Some changes in her work and career allowed her to have more time to paint when she felt led to do so. Once she realized that her paintings were extremely popular sales items, and she had massive requests for more, she was able to host her own personal exhibition.
Black Hole – Cathrin Machin
Now she is doing various works depicting everything from gaseous clouds, stars, nebulas, black holes, to large galaxies.
Cathrin Machin
Cathrin’s work is on various canvas sizes, and each one has an astounding photographic sense to it.
Galaxy and Quasar – Cathrin Machin
With the face of the Space Industry changing and becoming more commercialized, it’s important for those of us who love space and all things scientific keep the industry in check.
Painting by Cathrin Machin
Without inspiration, without remembering what the industry is all about and the heart of why it does what it does, it can get out of balance on (even legitimate, worthy of their place elements such as) fiscal, time/scheduling, and management issues (although these do have their place in appropriate settings).
The Black Hole – Cathrin Machin
It’s work like this and other endeavors in The Space Age Craze that are getting the world excited again and remind them what Space Exploration and Research is all about.
Painting by Cathrin Machin
What is it all about? Wisdom, knowledge, and just to bask in the amazement of the Universe’s wonders, which will lead to answering the deeper mysteries of why we’re here and what role we have to play.
Atlas V Launch – Cathrin Machin
This one is very close to my background in rocket engineering, the launch of an Atlas V depicted in one of Cathrin Machin’s paintings.
Painting by Cathrin Machin
Special thanks to Cathrin Machin for her permission to post images of her artwork.
Painting by Cathrin Machin
To see more of Cathrin’s work, and possibly purchase a print or original painting, visit her main website www.cathrinmachin.com, her Kickstarter link, her gallery of sales items HERE, and her Facebook site HERE.
For The Great Galactic Space Gimmick, I’m Gimmick Commander Ben Faltinowski! 🙂
© Ben Faltinowski and The Great Galactic Space Gimmick, 2017, authorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ben Faltinowski and The Great Galactic Space Gimmick with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
NOTE: Cathrin Machin was the artist for the paintings seen in this article, and I give her full credit for these. I used her images by permission.