Equus Collage

Whenever I go out at nighttime I always look for the Orion Constellation in the sky. Orion stands on his head in the southern hemisphere, but this doesn't detract the number of star watchers at all. This image was taken by the Hubble Telescope courtesy of NASA is The Horsehead Nebula in the constellation Orion.The nebula is located just to the south of the star Alnitak, which is farthest east on Orion's Belt, and is part of the much larger Orion Molecular Cloud Complex. It is approximately 1500 light years from Earth and is one of the most identifiable nebulae because of the shape of its swirling cloud of dark dust and gases, which bears some resemblance to a horse's head when viewed from Earth. The dark cloud of dust and gas is a region in the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex where star formation is taking place, located in the constellation of Orion, which, seen from the northern hemisphere, is prominent in the sky on winter evenings. This stellar nursery, as it is known, can contain over 100 known kinds of organic and inorganic gases as well as dust; some of the latter is made up of large and complex organic molecules. The red or pinkish glow originates from hydrogen gas predominantly behind the nebula, ionized by the nearby bright star Sigma Orionis. Magnetic fields channel the gases leaving the nebula into streams, shown as streaks in the background glow. A glowing strip of hydrogen gas marks the edge of the massive cloud, and the densities of nearby stars are noticeably different on either side. (WIKIPEDIA) I've used acrylic paint, acrylic ink, mulberry paper and silver leaf for this mixed media piece which I found were the best media to try and create something that is not three dimensional and it was really fun to make. If Carl Sagan and National Geographic are correct and we really are made of stardust, wouldn't it be cool if we became stars one day? :-)