The US Air Force Nearly Nuked the Moon. Amid a New Space Race, Artist Jitish Kallat Revisits the Secret Cold War Scheme
ARTnews recounts the US Air Force’s secret 1958 Project A119, which studied detonating a nuclear bomb on the Moon to gain scientific data and Cold War propaganda advantage, but was abandoned because risks outweighed benefits; the report, “A Study of Lunar Research Flights,” remained classified until the project leader disclosed it in 2000. Artist Jitish Kallat revisits the episode in Wall Drawing / Redux: A119 at the Menil Drawing Institute in Houston, on view through August 8, 2027, located about 30 miles from NASA’s Johnson Space Center. The installation prints declassified, partly redacted pages of the report on a wall and overlays them with electrically modulated glass film that shifts between opacity and clarity, using the building’s architecture to evoke secrecy and revelation. Kallat also addresses the material in Lunar Redux (2024–26), a photo-based installation using lenticular prints to create visual instability.
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This story was covered in Museum Expansions, AI Book Carnage, and Power Plays