space hero

starry night,  24"x48",  oil on canvas

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yury gagarin, a soviet cosmonaut, was the first human to journey into outer space,  his vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the earth on april 12, 1961.  this is how he described the view from space: 

"...rays were blazing through the atmosphere of the earth, the horizon became bright orange, gradually passing into all the colors of the rainbow: from light blue to dark blue, to violet and then to black. what an indescribable gamut of colors! just like the paintings of the artist nicholas roerich."

in a 2010 survey done by the international space foundation, yury gagarin was ranked as the 6th most popular space hero, tied with star trek's capt. james t. kirk.

at number 11 was capt. jean-luc picard, also of the starship enterprise, but from the 1980s television series, star trek: the text eneration.

neil armstrong, the 1st human to set foot on the moon was, not surprisingly, numero uno.

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