stella nix

For us living in the space age, it is difficult to imagine Jupiter without its iconic Great Red Spot, but as many you know, it will someday vanish, as all storms do.

What some of you may not know, is that is widely believed by current day astronomers that the Great Red Spot is actually fairly young, and historical observations of the spot spanning hundreds of years are believed to actually be multiple distinct storms.

The Great Red Spot we know today appeared sometime in the 19th Century, and is drawn here based on an astronomical sketch produced by J. Gledhill on the 1st of December, 1871, and later published in the Astronomical Register, Vol X, in 1873.

His observation, and many others from the same period, describe the large spot as a ring shape, or at minimum not as dark as we see it today, implying that for some time the spot was actually red, with the storm only gaining its distinct coloration in the early 1870s or late 1860s. Within a decade’s time, the spot would be consistently depicted and described as red.

Below is the sketch in question.

This painting was inspired by a recent work by @whirligig-girl, of a similar pair of sketches from 1879. She encouraged me heavily to make this piece, and it was a very fun piece to make!

She even used her understanding of telescope optics to create this recreation of Gledhill’s view of Jupiter on that brisk winter night, 155 years ago!

And for fun, she also set our Jupiter’s side by side.

What a difference a decade makes!!