When Rosa Fedele first painted Gordana, it was only meant for her second novel, but a microscopic copy of it is soon on its way to the moon.
The artwork depicts a close-up of a woman holding a ring of keys, and is part of her book The Legacy of Beuregarde - a story about a lady who isolates in a tower in Sydney's Hunters Hill.
The artist from Burradoo is one of many across the globe who have had their pieces reproduced for a time capsule for the Lunar Codex, which will be transported by NASA.
More than 30,000 artists, writers, musicians and filmmakers from 162 countries and 67 Indigenous nations, will have their works put in a series of capsules.
"I think we're all absolutely chuffed or say over the moon that we'll have art, going over the moon," the artist said.
"It's mind-blowing and too big to grasp."
The project uses digital and analog technology to store hundreds of digitised of artworks, music, TV shows, podcasts, poems, and books.
Artworks are on a nickel nanofiche which is the size of an American dime, and are each reproduced three times in red, green and blue channels, so they can be decoded to their original colourings.
The technology is expected to last for hundreds of thousands of years.
Gordana will be on the Codex Nova which is due to launch around February 14, and the Codex Polaris via a SpaceX Falcon heavy rocket in November.
Bestselling author, physicist, composer and film producer Dr Samuel Peralta founded the Lunar Codex because he always dreamed of going to the moon.
He curated the Shelter exhibition separately during the pandemic, which features the painting Ms Fedele submitted.
The aim was for the exhibition to focus on solace, hope and shelter and "documenting a movement in time".
The exhibition then inspired the Lunar Codex, and will be featured on a microscopic scale.
"Rosa Fedele's piece 'Gordana' - depicting a woman holding a ring of keys - spoke to me as a potent symbol of that hope, that one day the doors would again be opened to our lives," he said.
The Highlands artist said she was "overwhelmed", but the capsules set the tone for her plans for the year, with many "huge" plans on the cards.
Ms Fedele has been a finalist in a number of awards such as the Copes Family Portrait Prize in Bowral, Portia Geach Art Prize, Hunters Hill Art Prize (and judge), Bluethumb Art Prize, Mortimer Art Prize, and Best of City and Country Art Prize.
Her artwork of singer-songwriter and Australian Eurovision representative Montaigne, was a finalist in the Portia Geach Memorial Art Prize and Lethbridge 10000, and selected for the international show Adorn Me.
Artworks have been exhibited across the Highlands, Sydney and its inner suburbs, Melbourne, Chicago, Denver, and had work displayed at Australia's Parliament House.
The artist has also judged and won awards with the Lane Cove Art Prize, and was named the Foundation's Choice in the Kennedy Prize in 2023.
Briannah Devlin
I like to write about arts, entertainment, any local reality tv leads, and property for the Southern Highland News and Goulburn Post, but also report on everything in between. If you have any tips, please send them to Briannah.Devlin@austcommunitymedia.com.au, or call 0439142204.
I like to write about arts, entertainment, any local reality tv leads, and property for the Southern Highland News and Goulburn Post, but also report on everything in between. If you have any tips, please send them to Briannah.Devlin@austcommunitymedia.com.au, or call 0439142204.
