This is “Constellation of Orion, defocused trails” photographed by David Malin in 1985. This is a long exposure photograph of stars in the constellation Orion the Hunter. It was slowly defocused in a series of steps to bring out the differences in point sources of light that can look quite uniform at a quick glance. Time has a way of doing that with everything. People, places and things differentiate over time. But here time is only responsible for the movement of the stars. Its partner in crime is focus, which spreads out much of the light that was wasted when concentrated allowing us to see these stars in their full beauty. Art can provide that defocus to life. And aging art is even better because it has that extra dimension of time. Art itself changes what we see in the world and time changes the perspective from which we see it. The star trails’ directions merge together, which takes what could possibly seen as a fast moving scene and turns it into something more like a dance. To me, the red star is a celebrity chased by the blue paparazzi. The Hunter being hunted. Image © 1985-2002, Australian Astronomical Observatory.
