In a message dated 8/30/2002 12:18:23 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
>  << As an example, several years ago, the National Air and Space Museum
> hosted
>  the
>   Star Wars exhibit. It was clearly a pop-culture, science-fiction exhibit
> that
>   had nothing to do with real science. While it was a cool exhibit, I
thought
>   that it was entirely inappropriate for NASM because it was out of the
scope
>  of
>   the museum. On the other hand, it would have fit in great at the National
>   Museum of American History as they do have a pop-culture collection. (Not
>   trying to start another flame war here. :) >>

The Star Wars exhibit was produced by the now defunct Department of Art &
Culture whose mission was exploring flight's influence into those two areas.
Therefore, Star Wars was perfectly within our mission, as were the other
exhibits presented by the department such as Star Trek and Flight-time Barbie
(that sounds like a joke, but people still asked for it years later). All
these exhibits explored how flight and space travel had become a part of
culture and how it inspired artists and dreamers.

Because of the number of artifacts and expected crowds, the text in the Star
Wars exhibit was very basic. However, if you look at the exhibit catalogue,
it clearly deals with the way that aviation and space flight influenced the
movies (although the catalogue was also dumbed down in the edit stage). And
not just with the overall ideas, but things such as how the wing of an F-16
influenced the wing of a tie-fighter, how a reflector bombsight works, or how
the USAF combat box was repeated by the rebels when destroying the Death
Star. As well as other issues that came into play such as fascism, the
environment and the rise of science fiction.

The reality of flight and spaceflight has forced us as a culture to reimagine
the world, the universe and our dreams. Showing how spaceflight influenced
one visionary to take our traditional myths and stories and update them to be
in the stars is clearly part of this story. And seeing it inspires the next
generation of dreamers and creators- I feel very safe in betting that the
Lucas films inspired more rocket engineers/ NASA people of that generation
than film people. For many Americans, and other people, the Millenium Falcon
and Death Star are more real than Apollo 11 and the Eagle.

If a museum wants to stick to the history and facts, that's fine. But clearly
the public welcomes this part of the story as the Department of Art &
Culture's exhibits were always among the most visited.
Cause sometimes a quilt is more than a way to keep warm.

Pamela Feltus

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