Files
Download Piece Here (3.1 MB)
Date Range
Fall 2018
Contributor
Donald T. Austin
Description
Nations, like stars, are entitled to eclipse. All is well, provided the light returns and the eclipse does not become endless night. Dawn and resurrection are synonymous. The reappearance of the light is the same as the survival of the soul.
Victor Hugo
Dimensions
36" X 18"
Exhibition
Faculty
Material
Digital Inkjet Proof; Images produced with iPhoto 7+ phone camera; Typography and layout produced in Adobe Illustrator
Place
Oregon
Provenance
Columbus, Ohio
Time Period
Fall 2018
For Sale?
Yes
Recommended Citation
Austin, Donald T., "Sun 1" (2018). Don Austin - Be Well Out Here: The Big Go West. 15.
https://digitalcommons.otterbein.edu/bewell/15
Comments
We drove through the night to arrive at 6:30 am August 21, 2017 just north of Long Creek, Oregon. For the last week, the news reported videos of millions traveling to Oregon to observe the Solar Eclipse. Small towns within the “total band” ran out of fuel, water and food due to the huge inundation of people. I found a pull-out on the side of US Highway 395 in the Umatilla National Forest with no other cars and parked. Thirty minutes later, the pull-out was filled with over seventy vehicles. At least 200 people joined together and anxiously waited. These images do not fully illustrate what Conrad and I witnessed. I don’t have accurate words to describe it either. What I can say, when the moon went total in front of the sun, turbulent shadows raced across the ground and the stars came out. It happened so fast, it was as if someone had turned the light off in a room. For one minute and fifteen seconds, something went through me… something went through Conrad… something went through everyone standing there. I don’t know what that something was, but we were all forever changed. This was the most spectacular thing I had ever seen in my life.