274 moons

Making of Ymir, Paaliaq and Tarvos / April 15th to April 20th 2025

21. Apr 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

I am making my way down the list of moons and have arrived at the non-Greek mythology moons. Ymir is a retrograde moon named after the ancestor of the frost giants in Norse mythology. Paaliaq and Tarvos are both irregular moons orbiting Saturn in a prograde motion. Tarvos belongs to the Gallic group and is named after a god in the shape of a bull carrying three cranes on his back. Paaliaq, on the other hand, is part of the Inuit group of moons around Saturn. It was named after a fictional shaman. I made these three moons using heavily grogged black clay and covered two of them with porcelain slip which I applied with a sponge. These vases were made in my home studio, and were finished on Easter Sunday. We don't really celebrate Easter, but we did spend some time gardening in the pleasant weather.

Making of Ymir, Paaliaq and Tarvos / April 15th to April 20th 2025

Making of Hyperion / April 14th 2025

15. Apr 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

Hyperion is a large non-spherical moon that is probably a large collection of debris from ice and rocks. I have plans for this moon to be glazed with an oil spot-type glaze which I started testing last week. The first test did not turn out as expected so I will have to tinker with the chemistry a bit. I am approaching the end of the list of moons that have received names inspired from Greek and Roman mythology. Someone asked me about the shapes I am giving the moons. I have deliberately chosen a shape that is distantly reminiscent of the Korean moon jar, without directly replicating it. Moon jars have deep cultural meaning and I do not want to appropriate it. Like the moon jars, my moons have asymmetries. They are not thrown on the wheel and retain irregularities that I choose to amplify instead of mask.

Making of Helene and Calypso / 13th April 2025

13. Apr 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

Helen and Calypso are both Trojan moons, trailing moons that share orbits with other bodies orbiting Saturn. They are both irregularly shaped and quite reflective. Calypso specifically seems to have something on its surface capable of smoothing its craters, which scientists believe to be icy material coming from one of Saturn's rings. Because of the scale of this project, I set up a little corner in my home studio to work with clay and make from home when I cannot be in the studio and if for some reason I feel like making at strange hours of the night. It's how it all started so it feels quite natural to go back to a version of what I know. I realized I had restricted my ability to create to the hours I am in the studio, which works but also places limitations to my practice. I have a very spartan set up at home: one standing banding wheel, one board, a small wooden bench for pieces to dry, and a few tools I know I use. These are also the first vases I am making for this project that feature a dark grey stoneware. It is one of my go to clays, but so far I had only used red stoneware and porcelain. I was asked whether there is a connection between the clay I choose and the moon I am making. The answer is: sometimes. Before I start making a vase I usually look up the moon online. If there are photos of the moon, I will look at it for a while. With a few exceptions, the moons will look similar, especially for smaller ones that trail the orbits of bigger moons. If a moon has a very specific feature, I will try to incorporate it in the surface treatment and/or glaze. The project is not meant to be a scientific reproduction of each moon, so I do not feel bound by the features of the moon in a strict sense.

Making of Helene and Calypso / 13th April 2025

Making of Dione and Rhea / 8th April 2025

8. Apr 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

Dione and Rhea were photographed by the Cassini probe in 2010. The image was taken from a specific perspective, making them look as if these two moons were one celestial body in the shape of a strange snowman. However, Dione and Rhea are two distinct moons orbiting around Saturn. I made the two vases out of porcelain on the 5th and 7th of April 2025. On the 5th I made them by pinching the base and coiling the body and on the 7th I refined them, shaved them and smoothened them over. I struggled a bit with these two. I had to start again because the base collapsed as I was coiling. Sometimes starting works better because working with slightly dryer clay can be beneficial to the stability of the piece. I have committed to making as many as I can with porcelain, so I am used to having to troubleshoot. One of the moons is slightly bulgier on one side - only a few of the actual moons around Saturn are perfectly round anyways - but I decided I am OK with it. I always start each moon with the same amount of clay, 300g. The end result is quite lightweight but I have made a deliberate decision not to make them all 100% identical in terms of final size. They will all be similar but unique. Because I feel that the process of making these moons is taking too long, I have resolved to bring some clay home and to set up a small station in my home studio. Until now, my home studio has mostly been for silversmithing, but I love the light in there and I want to be able to create more moons if the mood strikes late at night or when I am not in the studio. This project is an exercise in discipline. I am not sure how I think about my own artistic practice and I am not sure I need to find a definition for it. But if I had to use one word I would say commitment is what describes it best.

Making of Dione and Rhea / 8th April 2025

Making of Epimetheus and Janus / April 2nd 2025

6. Apr 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

Epimetheus and Janus are sister moons, orbiting Saturn. Both are potato shaped and share a similar orbit around Saturn. It is possible that they are the result of the breakup of one moon. Every 4 Earth years, they trade spaces in their orbits due to the gravitational interaction between the two bodies. They both trail quite a bit of dust and particles (possibly due to impacts from foreign bodies), so that a faint ring, the Janus/Epimetheus Ring, shares their orbit. I started making them together on March 28th and could only finish them on April 2nd due to health issues. I had built the base and coiled the shape but needed to refine them and shave off a bit of clay. Thankfully I had wrapped them tightly and did not have to start again.

Making of Epimetheus and Janus / April 2nd 2025

Making of Phoebe / April 5th 2025

6. Apr 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

Phoebe is a mysterious moon. It orbits far from Saturn and only reflects about 6% of the sunlight it receives. It is a dark and irregularly shaped object which is believed to be a primordial centaur: a captured object from the Kuiper Belt dating from the formation of the solar system. I made Phoebe in the space of 2 days, between the 3rd and 5th of April 2025, right as we were about to find out that the world was potentially going into a trade war. This week has been frustrating. Personally I feel that this project is the only thing that keeps me going. I am at the point of the project where I need to be more organized and I need to keep track of all the vases I am making. They also need to be marked so that I don't lose track of them through the firing process. At one point, I will just have lot of similar looking vases with no way of distinguishing them. For this reason, I decided to mark the bottoms of the vases with the IAU Number of the celestial body provided by the International Astronomical Union. I also put together an excel sheet where I keep track of each moon's progress, when the moon was made and finished, whether I have recorded a diary entry and its intended surface treatment. Phoebe is potentially a primordial centaur and I would love for it to be decorated with some metallic glaze, which I have been testing in the last few weeks.

Making Iapetus / Friday 14th March 2025

15. Mär 2025Elisabetta Lombardo

I do not keep a paper diary. I do have several notebooks with notes, drawings, sketches, ideas, glaze recipes and poems. But I do not write every day. I know all the great writers do - and I do not consider myself one. If I ever started writing a diary documenting my work, it would have to be now, in these times. The mundane and the extraordinary are intertwined. 14th March 2025 I worked on Iapetus at our studio over the course of 3 hours, while we were open to the public and people came and went, bringing in their work for firing or picking up their finished ceramics. I struggled to finally sit down to make this vase, as I struggled to not be interrupted while making a few glaze tests a few hours earlier. Wedging, pinching. Will the glaze really look metallic? It felt like a Saturday at the studio. We were busy. I had great conversations with Pam. Should I have tested another recipe? I built the vase from two pinched pots. The shaping of it was the most time consuming, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. At then end, I applied some porcelain slip on one side of the vase. I should have eaten a snack. ----- Iapetus is Saturn's third largest moon (1436km in diameter) and has an orbit period around Saturn of 79 days. It was discovered by Giovanni Cassini on Oct. 25, 1671. When the Cassini probe flew by Iapetus in 2007, it sent back incredible images of the planet. One hemisphere is white (probably covered in ice), and one is significantly darker (featuring craters), which is not yet completely explained. Image credits: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute Orbits and positions of Saturn's 250 irregular moons as of March 2025.