The Moon Museum was the brainchild of Frosty Myers, whom we know from The Wall. It is a tiny ceramic wafer, three-quarters of an inch by half an inch, that contains drawings by six artists, including Andy Warhol and Frosty himself. Frosty wanted to create the first museum in space by securing this small—but art-filled—piece somewhere in the 1969 Apollo 12 mission. NASA wasn’t responsive to Frosty’s proposal, but he was able to find an engineer who supported the idea and smuggled the wafer onto the lander module and would therefore be left on the moon. Two days before takeoff, Frosty received a telex (which was like a text message back in 1969) with the message “All systems go,” which was code for success. It remains the first and only museum in space.
1969 | Frosty Myers creates Moon Museum |
1969 | Smuggled on the moon, making it first art piece in space |