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03-011 "Distant Sisters"
2003, digital

At the edge of our solar system, Pluto and its moon Charon form what is essentially a double planet. Charon is so large - half the size of Pluto - that neither can be said to orbit the other in a traditional sense; they orbit mutually, with the center of this dance residing between them (but closer to the more massive Pluto). This celestial ballet is repeated once every 6.39 days, and since both bodies are rotationally locked to one another, this is also the length of their day/night cycle. The surfaces of either of these bodies is not well known, of course. The large-scale variations in brightness mapped by the Space Telescope were used to help create this artwork, but the details remain a mystery.

We do know that Pluto boasts a thin methane atmosphere when near the sun (as it is presently); this should snow out onto the ground as the planet's eccentric orbit carries it even farther from the sun's warmth. Some artists have based their interpretations of Pluto on Neptune's large moon Triton, which has almost no impact craters and plenty of active water geysers that have reworked most of the landscape. However, I feel that although Pluto seems to have undergone trauma in early life (possibly including being ejected from orbit around Neptune as well) that Pluto now would have gained some impact craters that Charon's tidal forces could not erase by inducing volcanic activity on Pluto.

I therefore created a "compromise" Pluto, with ample evidence of massive resurfacing long ago, with more recent impact scars superimposed atop it. By all reports, Charon seems to be a fairly straightforward battered snowball, with no atmosphere. An interesting note is that Charon is mythologically the boatman who pilots souls down the river Styx to Pluto's underworld. The usual pronunciation of "Kar-on", however, is modified in this instance to honor the wife of the astronomer who found and named Charon: Charlene. Thus, Charon is supposed to be said "Shar-on". Unlike the common scam where companies claim to name a star after someone (such names are completely unofficial), Charon is a lasting token of affection in the dim distant reaches of our solar system.

Chris Butler