Burgess believes that projects like the Moon Ark will impact the human role in the colonization of the solar system.
"In a broad sense it is the whole notion of expansion of human culture beyond the surface of the Earth and the critically tilting moment was when in 1958 people realized that humans will occupy outer space and if we are going to do that then it will be all of us and every aspect of culture is going to move there,” Burgess said.
The idea was initiated by Burgess and was designed mostly at the Carnegie Mellon University. The structure weighs no more than six ounces and has all of the major art forms represented on it.
According to the artist, there is a highly organized effort by NASA and other space agencies to lay the infrastructure that will take us out into the solar system, specifically to Mars and the Moon, becoming a space station for humanity.
Burgess said that the labor to make this art happen has been going on since the mid sixties and he has an unbelievable team working on this project together with him.
“We have over 300 people who have given significant innovations to the Moon Ark. It is absolutely new in every way. The art is totally new, all of the sciences: material and cognitive sciences are also brand new. There have been new technologies invented for it: new hardware and software and all kinds of applications have been developed for it,” Burgess said.
It is essentially an object of humanity’s cultural heritage. However, it will not be the only human artwork on the surface of another planet.
Back in 1969 a small group of artists smuggled a thumb-sized chip known as the Moon Museum on the Apollo 12 lunar lander.
The chip had drawing of six famous artists of the era and was the first piece of art in space.
