Quite a lot to like about this, including the colours and the unattached elements, even the tone of the board it’s sitting on! But it doesn’t say anything to me. No coherence, no story.

These are small birds on what I intended to be green-screen, but they reminded me too much of what I believe may have been Romulan lettering from Star Trek so they had to go. Again, no story.

This is a tiny piece of shiny card, punched out with a hole punch and standing in for planet Earth with the help of some dabs of acrylic paint.

The entire purpose of space travel is to discover what’s out there. Much as explorers of every population from the beginning of sentience have done. The linear artefact at the bottom of the image is a reminder that either we are not alone or we missed this other sentience by a span of time that could be anything from millennia to a few weeks. I don’t know what it is.

I was not keen on the white pencil/paint touch and reduced it using black/brown watercolour pencil.

Interestingly, I found the subtle version underwhelming from a distance so reinstated the white lines. Then removed them again (below).

There’s a small pale dot on the left of the painting that seems to be in Moon position, which I suspect is a splash of water. I tried to remove it, then to resintate it, but neither worked very well. Maybe another drip is the answer.

“All of humanity”. Christina Koch, Artemis astronaut describing her thoughts when looking at the Earth from the Orion capsule on their return journey from the Moon. April 2026. This painting represents some of the unseen forces – gravity, solar flares, magnetic turbulances, meteorites – that both assist and impede space travel.

Made in PowerDirector. Audio is via NASA on a free-to-use non-commercial basis.

I may be back if I can make another understated moon.

© Suzanne Conboy-Hill 2026