Will Wharton
Quarantined Nostalig Melody

Quarantined Nostalgic Melody - Wharton Dec. 2021 A music box with a haunting, lethally sentimental tune is abandoned on the moon. *In June 2022, Quarantined Nostalgic Melody will be nanolithographed onto a small disc that will be left on the moon in an upcoming N.A.S.A. research mission. The work will be auctioned as an NFT in the months preceding the launch. Music by Erik Shiboski When I was initially asked to create an artwork for the moon, I was struck by the weight of this task. The moon was abstract—a feeling or a mood, not a place. On long night walks, I began to think about the 1960s, when we first sent astronauts to the moon. I thought of the music during that time, its romance, its nostalgia. That dreamy time was a rare moment in history where humanity collectively confronted its place in the universe as we spun on our pale blue dot. I shared these thoughts with my girlfriend, who gave me the first piece of inspiration for this project. She showed me the song “Lunar Rhapsody”, by Dr. Samuel J. Hoffman and Les Baxter, a beautiful composition with many chapters. Neil Armstrong played this song on his way back to earth from the moon. I listened to it over and over again; its evocative melody brought me to a vulnerable and sentimental place. During this same period, I was learning about the idea of “nostalgia” itself. Swiss soldiers died of this apparently deadly disease many centuries ago, or so doctors at the time believed… Many soldiers in the army were depressed, sad, homesick, and unmotivated. They longed to be home, walking through the pastures of their family farms, and whistling the songs of their youth. However, army doctors began to see this “condition” as a growing epidemic. This large-scale breakout of nostalgia could only be cured by sending soldiers home or imposing strict rules to stop the spread; even whistling a song from home was an offense punishable by death. This is the second idea that gripped me as I began to conceptualize my piece—the idea that a simple melody was so dangerous that it had to be suppressed. I imagined a song similar to Hoffman’s Lunar Rhapsody, but stranger and eerier—a tune so nostalgic that it was quarantined to prevent people from drowning in the comfort and coziness of the past. Contained in a surreal music box, it is sent to space to be disarmed, existing in a new dimensional context in which music and sound are living objects. Throughout this process I reflected on our conceptions of the future and how we similarly dispose of any “obsolete” ideas and old sentiments. Propelled by our insatiable thirst for progress, we push forwards, often cleaning up the messes we create only when it’s too late. I see this a lot in the NFT and tech world, where art history and lessons of the past are lost in the evangelism of building the future. Old institutions are suspicious, dangerous entities; our true salvation resides in technology. With that said, I am a huge believer in technology and its potential for good, though sometimes it feels like we are running so fast that we get tangled in our own digital shoelaces. Perhaps this is the price we must pay for progress, but let’s not forget to read the warning signs as we move into these digital sanctuaries. There is something impersonal and alienating about living between digital and physical worlds. Maybe it is because we disassociate from our bodies or because there is a coldness to the measured and logical outlook that many of us have today. We can learn from the romance of the 1960s—a warmth, beauty, and wisdom that we can take with us. As we venture into these digital alcoves, perhaps these sentiments can help us find our footing and navigate the path ahead. Process My artistic process combines traditional fine art techniques with innovative digital media technologies. For example, to animate the forms in Quarantined Nostalgic Melody, I created a new technique combining practical stop motion animation and software-based virtual reality sculpting. This highly experimental, pan-design method allows me to approach art through a multidisciplinary cultural context which emphasizes innovative creation with digital and mass media. This allows me to treat art as a process and way of thinking.