Jon Lomberg (born 1948) is an American

space art Space art, also known as astronomical art, is a genre of art that Visual representation, visually depicts the universe through various Style (visual arts), artistic styles. It may also refer to Work of art, artworks sent into Outer space, space. ...

ist and

science journalist Science journalism conveys reporting about science to the public. The field typically involves interactions between scientists, journalists and the public. Origins Modern science journalism originated in weather and other natural history obs ...

. He was

Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is his research on the possibility of extraterrestrial life, including e ...

's principal artistic collaborator for more than twenty years on many projects from 1972 through 1996. In 1998, the

International Astronomical Union The International Astronomical Union (IAU; , UAI) is an international non-governmental organization (INGO) with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreach, education, and developmen ...

officially named an asteroid ( 6446 Lomberg) in recognition of his achievements in science communication. He was NASA's Design Director for the Golden Record on the Voyager spacecraft; the cover he designed is expected to last at least a billion years.

Biography

Jon Lomberg grew up in

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

. During a visit to

Toronto, Ontario Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

, after college, he was invited by science fiction author

Judith Merril Judith Josephine Grossman (January 21, 1923 – September 12, 1997), who took the pen-name Judith Merril around 1945, was an American and then Canadian science fiction writer, editor and political activist, and one of the first women to be widel ...

to display his artwork at a conference she organised for the

Ontario Institute for Studies in Education The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto (OISE/UT) is Canada's only all-graduate institute of teaching, learning and research. It is located at 252 Bloor Street West on the university's St. George campus in ...

. Lomberg moved to Toronto later that year and, after assisting Merril in a radio documentary for the

CBC Radio One CBC Radio One is the English-language news and information radio network of the publicly owned Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It is commercial-free and offers local and national programming. It is available on AM and FM to 98 percent o ...

program '' Ideas'', went on to create many documentaries on topics such as

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

Viking program The ''Viking'' program consisted of a pair of identical American space probes, ''Viking 1'' and ''Viking 2'' both launched in 1975, and landed on Mars in 1976. The mission effort began in 1968 and was managed by the NASA Langley Research Cent ...

and

Halley's Comet Halley's Comet is the only known List of periodic comets, short-period comet that is consistently visible to the naked eye from Earth, appearing every 72–80 years, though with the majority of recorded apparitions (25 of 30) occurring after ...

for the program. In 1972, Lomberg showed some of his paintings to astronomer

, who then asked him to illustrate his book '' The Cosmic Connection'' (1973). This was the beginning of their quarter century of

collaboration Collaboration (from Latin ''com-'' "with" + ''laborare'' "to labor", "to work") is the process of two or more people, entities or organizations working together to complete a task or achieve a goal. Collaboration is similar to cooperation. The ...

on many projects, including the Cosmos series (for which Lomberg created the talent pool and as chief artist won a

Primetime Emmy Award The Primetime Emmy Awards, or Primetime Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Owned and operated by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), the P ...

), the ''Cosmos'' book, '' Broca's Brain'',

's interstellar

Voyager Golden Record The Voyager Golden Records are two identical phonograph records, one of each which were included aboard the two Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977. The records contain sounds and data to reconstruct raster scan images selected to portray the di ...

, the original

cover art Cover art is a type of artwork presented as an illustration or photograph on the outside of a published product, such as a book (often on a dust jacket), magazine, newspaper ( tabloid), comic book, video game ( box art), music album ( album ar ...

for Sagan's 1985 novel '' Contact'', and the opening sequence from

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

through the

Solar System The Solar SystemCapitalization of the name varies. The International Astronomical Union, the authoritative body regarding astronomical nomenclature, specifies capitalizing the names of all individual astronomical objects but uses mixed "Sola ...

and its galaxy and beyond for the 1997 ''Contact'' film. At Sagan's request, Lomberg designed the original sailing ship logo for the

Planetary Society The Planetary Society is an American internationally-active non-governmental nonprofit organization. It is involved in research, public outreach, and political space advocacy for engineering projects related to astronomy, planetary science, an ...

in 1981.

The

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums, Education center, education and Research institute, research centers, created by the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government "for the increase a ...

commissioned Lomberg in the early 1990s to paint ''"A Portrait of the Milky Way"'', a scientifically accurate artistic representation of the

Milky Way The Milky Way or Milky Way Galaxy is the galaxy that includes the Solar System, with the name describing the #Appearance, galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars in other arms of the galax ...

galaxy as seen by a hypothetical observer from a vantage point 10 degrees above the

galactic plane The galactic plane is the plane (geometry), plane on which the majority of a disk-shaped galaxy's mass lies. The directions perpendicular to the galactic plane point to the galactic poles. In actual usage, the terms ''galactic plane'' and ''galac ...

and 60,000

light year A light-year, alternatively spelled light year (ly or lyr), is a unit of length used to express astronomical distance, astronomical distances and is equal to exactly , which is approximately 9.46 trillion km or 5.88 trillion mi. As defined by t ...

s from the

galactic center The Galactic Center is the barycenter of the Milky Way and a corresponding point on the rotational axis of the galaxy. Its central massive object is a supermassive black hole of about 4 million solar masses, which is called Sagittarius A*, a ...

. The by painting, which was described in a

peer review Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work (:wiktionary:peer#Etymology 2, peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the ...

ed academic paper in 1994 as "the best representation of our galaxy to date" and "a first map like those of explorers long ago", was displayed in the

National Air and Space Museum The National Air and Space Museum (NASM) of the Smithsonian Institution is a museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States, dedicated to history of aviation, human flight and space exploration. Established in 1946 as the National Air Museum, ...

from 1992 through 2002 and remains part of its permanent collection of

aviation Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. ''Aircraft'' include fixed-wing and rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-than-air aircraft such as h ...

and

. Lomberg also designed the Galaxy Garden, a three-dimensional walk-through

scale model which is part of the Paleaku Peace Gardens Sanctuary in

Kailua-Kona, Hawaii Kailua-Kona is an Unincorporated area#United States, unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Hawaii County, Hawaii, Hawaii County, Hawaii, United States. It is most commonly referred to simply as Kona (a name it shares wit ...

. Lomberg co-designed the

MarsDial The MarsDial is a sundial that was devised for missions to Mars. It is used to calibrate the Pancam, Pancam cameras of the Mars landers. MarsDials were placed on the ''Spirit (rover), Spirit'' and ''Opportunity (rover), Opportunity'' Mars Explorat ...

aboard the

Mars Exploration Rover NASA's Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission was a robotic space mission involving two Mars rovers, ''Spirit (rover), Spirit'' and ''Opportunity (rover), Opportunity'', exploring the planet Mars. It began in 2003 with the launch of the two rove ...

s '' Spirit'' and ''

Opportunity Opportunity may refer to: Places * Opportunity, Montana, an unincorporated community, United States * Opportunity, Nebraska, an unincorporated community, United States * Opportunity, Washington, a former census-designated place, United States * ...

'', and was the project director and editor-in-chief for the ''Visions of Mars''

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains computer data storage, data computers can read, but not write or erase. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold b ...

and mini-

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

aboard the spacecraft '' Phoenix'', which landed on

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmosph ...

in May 2008. He was also on the

Waste Isolation Pilot Plant The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, or WIPP, in New Mexico, US, is a deep geological repository licensed to store transuranic radioactive waste for 10,000 years. The storage rooms at the WIPP are 2,150 feet (660 m) underground in a salt formatio ...

planning teams with

Frank Drake Frank Donald Drake (May 28, 1930 – September 2, 2022) was an American astrophysicist and astrobiologist. He began his career as a radio astronomer, studying the planets of the Solar System and later pulsars. Drake expanded his interests ...

, Ben Finney,

Ward Goodenough Ward Hunt Goodenough II (May 30, 1919 – June 9, 2013) was an American anthropologist, who has made contributions to kinship studies, linguistic anthropology, cross-cultural studies, and cognitive anthropology. Biography and major works G ...

Louis Narens Louis Narens (died October 5, 2022) was the Graduate Director of Mathematical Behavioral Science, Professor in the Department of Cognitive Sciences and the Department of Logic and the Philosophy of Science at the University of California, Irvine. H ...

, Frederick Newmeyer, Woodruff Sullivan and others. Jon Lomberg is a founding member of the International Association of Astronomical Artists, a member of the

advisory council, and designs exhibits and gives presentations for the Mauna Kea Astronomy Education Center in

Hilo, Hawaii Hilo () is the largest settlement in and the county seat of Hawaii County, Hawaiʻi, United States, which encompasses the Island of Hawaiʻi, and is a census-designated place (CDP). The population was 44,186 according to the 2020 census. I ...

for the Mauna Kea Observatory and Gemini North. He lives in Hawaii with his wife and two children.

Bibliography

The books Jon Lomberg has co-authored and/or illustrated include: * 1978:

Ann Druyan Ann Druyan ( ; born June 13, 1949) is an American documentary producer and director specializing in the communication of science. She co-wrote the 1980 PBS documentary series ''Cosmos'', hosted by Carl Sagan, whom she married in 1981. She i ...

Timothy Ferris Timothy Ferris (born August 29, 1944) is an American science writer and the best-selling author of twelve books, including ''The Science of Liberty'' (2010) and ''Coming of Age in the Milky Way'' (1988), for which he was awarded the American I ...

, Jon Lomberg, Linda Salzman Sagan. '' Murmurs of Earth: The Voyager Interstellar Record''.

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

Random House Random House is an imprint and publishing group of Penguin Random House. Founded in 1927 by businessmen Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer as an imprint of Modern Library, it quickly overtook Modern Library as the parent imprint. Over the foll ...

. . * 1979:

, '' Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science.''

. . * 1997: Donald Goldsmith, ''Worlds Unnumbered: The Search For Extrasolar Planets.''

Herndon, Virginia Herndon is a town in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. Located in Northern Virginia, it is part of the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. In 2020, the population at the census was 24,655, which makes i ...

: University Science Books. . * 1997: Donald Goldsmith, ''Einstein's Greatest Blunder? The Cosmological Constant and Other Fudge Factors in the Physics of the Universe.''

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is an academic publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. Its director since 2017 is George Andreou. The pres ...

. . * 2001: Donald Goldsmith and Tobias Owen, ''The Search for Life in the Universe.''

: University Science Books. . * 2004: David W. Thomson and James Bourassa, ''Secrets of the Aether: Unified Force Theory, Dark Matter and Consciousness.'' Alma, Illinois: The Aenor Trust. .

Awards and honors

The awards and honors which have been bestowed upon Jon Lomberg include: * 1979:

American Institute of Graphic Arts The American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) is a professional organization for design. Its members practice all forms of communication design, including graphic design, typography, interaction design, user experience, branding and identity. The ...

Certificate of Excellence for the cover of '' Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science.'' * 1981:

from the

Academy of Television Arts and Sciences The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), also colloquially known as the Television Academy, is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the television industry in the United States. A 501(c)(6) non-profit or ...

for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Creative Technical Crafts for the TV series ''

Cosmos The cosmos (, ; ) is an alternative name for the universe or its nature or order. Usage of the word ''cosmos'' implies viewing the universe as a complex and orderly system or entity. The cosmos is studied in cosmologya broad discipline covering ...

.'' * 1983: ''Graphic Design USA'' magazine DESI Award for

nuclear winter Nuclear winter is a severe and prolonged anti-greenhouse effect, global climatic cooling effect that is hypothesized to occur after widespread firestorms following a large-scale Nuclear warfare, nuclear war. The hypothesis is based on the fact ...

artwork in ''

PARADE A parade is a procession of people, usually organized along a street, often in costume, and often accompanied by marching bands, floats, or sometimes large balloons. Parades are held for a wide range of reasons, but are usually some variety ...

'' magazine. * 1984: Vermont World Peace Film Festival Prize for Best Video Documentary for the videotape of the multi-media show ''Nuclear Winter'' with Carl Sagan. * 1987:

Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism The Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism is located in Pulitzer Hall on the university's Morningside Heights campus in New York City. Founded in 1912 by Joseph Pulitzer, Columbia Journalism School is one of the oldest journalism sch ...

Armstrong Award for Documentary for the '' Ideas'' program ''Halley's Comet.'' * 1996:

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is a United States–based international nonprofit with the stated mission of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsib ...

Best Children's Science Book Award for the "Life In The Universe" curriculum for grades 4-9, in the Life Science category. * 1998:

officially renamed Asteroid Lomberg, formerly asteroid 6446 1990QL. * 2002:

Astronomical Society of the Pacific The Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP) is an American scientific and educational organization, founded in San Francisco on February 7, 1889, immediately following the solar eclipse of January 1, 1889. Its name derives from its origins on ...

Klumpke-Roberts Award.

References

External links

Official Jon Lomberg website

at the Paleaku Astronomy Center in

Captain Cook, Hawaii Captain Cook is a census-designated place (CDP) in Hawaii County, Hawaii, Hawaii County, Hawaii, in the United States, located in the District of South Kona. The community, within the land division of Kealakekua, is so named because the post of ...

. * * Two views of
A Portrait of the Milky Way
' on the Kepler Mission website. * Transcripts of two Robyn Williams shows with Jon Lomberg for the

Australian Broadcasting Corporation The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is Australia’s principal public service broadcaster. It is funded primarily by grants from the federal government and is administered by a government-appointed board of directors. The ABC is ...

: :
Voyager - A message from Earth
- 19 November 2005 at the

Sydney Observatory The Sydney Observatory is a heritage-listed meteorological station, astronomical observatory, function venue, science museum, and education facility located on Observatory Hill at Upper Fort Street, in the inner city Sydney suburb of Millers P ...

:
Jon Lomberg, In Conversation
- 5 January 2006 {{DEFAULTSORT:Lomberg, Jon 1948 births Living people Artists from Philadelphia Artists from Hawaii Space artists Primetime Emmy Award winners American science writers Interstellar messages