What's Hot in CF: NASA's Art Collection at Daytona Museum of Arts & Sciences

If you stand at a certain spot at the Daytona Beach Museum of Arts & Sciences, I'm told, you can see the skeleton of the prehistoric giant ground sloth behind you and a space suit that actually went to space ahead ahead of you. 

That spot encapsulates the MOAS: some rich, thoughtful collections of items from Florida’s past and others that make us look excitedly towards the future with spiffy, unexpected pit stops along the way. It all makes  for a pretty terrific road trip. 

The main event for us at MOAS (a Smithsonian affiliate) was the Florida Celebrates Space exhibit of NASA’s Art Collection which we had the pleasure of touring with Seth  Mayo, Curator of Astronomy at the Museum, who I interviewed for  What’s Hot in Central Florida on 90.7 FM WMFE (which you can hear on air at today 4:32 pm or click the link above to hear any time after noon today). Click the link and you can hear Seth talk about the origins of NASA getting artists to interpret the huge events going on under their auspices, from construction to training missions to space flight (and one of his many favorites in the collection. (above: Seth Mayo and I at MOAS with Jakan Pierce and Victoria Lawrence). 

It’s so much fun to hang out with someone who very clearly absolutely loves their job. Seth and Rene Belle Adams, Director of Communications, were both bubbling with enthusiasm about this exhibit and fair enough: if you’re a space nerd its going to make you pretty tingly but if you’re a space nerd and you have as much appreciation for art as for science this is a can’t-miss. There works by Andy Warhol, Peter Max, Annie Lebowitz and Robert Rauchenberg, prints so thoroughly of the era in which they were created that you will like you’ve time traveled and the juxtaposition of our Florida landscape (admit it: sometimes you look around and think you’re on Land of the Lost) and the massively technical endeavor of going to space. AND there are actual items that have gone to space, like the hatch cover from  Apollo 14. If this doesn't perfectly answer the title "Arts & Sciences" nothing does. (image: The Great White Bird, by Roger Cooke, perfect mix of the Florida environment and the high tech of space travel). 

The actual collection, which is housed at KSC, has more than 2000 items of which about 40 are on display here and all evoke dizzyingly different moods, from mistily romantic paintings to, super graphic pop art to minutely detailed realism to one of Navajo spirits protecting the astronauts as they go on their journey. For those of us who might love technology but are more in tune with the organic the NASA art collection makes space a friendlier place, not a dark void reachable only by incredibly complex machines but an ideal that never ceases to inspire wonder at the universe and humanity at its best (and at a time when we really need more of the latter). (Annie Lebovitz's portrait of shuttle commander Eileen Collins).

So that’s a must-see but make room for a lot more in your day because you’ll want to see the rest of the museum as well, including collections from Daytona’s Root family whose claim to fame was the design for the original Coca-Cola bottle (a shape drawn from that of the cocoa bean), hence a huge collection of Coke including a device from 1985 that make Coke drinkable in space. There are some serious vintage cars, too - some of the first ever to race on the Daytona Speedway, a massive teddy bear collection (including some massive teddy bears) and my favorite curio: a quilt collection that includes a compass rose pattern quilt, which was a signal, if hung outside a house that it was a safe house for those traveling via the Underground Railroad. 

For a thoroughly different kind of railroad experience you can also see the Root family’s mid century private train car, preserved in perfectly glorious art deco condition so you, too, can feel like you’re about to get on board with Hercule Poirot any second now. 

Other collections include some fantastic 19th century weaponry including a French Dragoon helmet (which I mention in order to use the word “dragoon”), a striking collection of Russian icons and an idea I absolutely love:  the “Visible Storage” collection, items from past exhibits stored in a glass-fronted format so you can see them all at once. For those with the treasure-hunting spirit the idea of finding a real Lakota war bonnet a hundred feet away from Napoleon’s death mask could give you a case of the vapors. 

There’s a lot of hands-on exhibits in the kids area, too, things that are simple, practical, educational and totally enjoyable by adults - it’s impressive to see how much is packed into this relatively small space and how rich and genuinely intriguing it all is. 

So head over to MOAS for any of their Florida Celebrates Space events or just to celebrate Florida and lots of other stuff along the way. After all, good Florida road trips are all about the detours.