Oliver Rennert's 'Discovery Cutaway'
A short history of the 'Discovery Cutaway' illustrations
"The idea for Discovery Cutaway came to me when I heard that Taschen Books were going to do a big, lavish feature book by space expert Piers Bizony on Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. Jan Harlan, executive producer to the late Stanley Kubrick and major advisor to Taschen, loved the idea for this illustration, as so far Discovery, the spaceship aboard which so much of the film drama takes place, had never been put portrayed as a cutaway, thus putting all the constituent parts into context. I understood my assignment to be that of producing a sort of Sunday supplement piece of art as might have appeared in the big newspapers of the time the fictional Jupiter mission of 2001 was launched. While the actual pure art image was suitably evocative for the Taschen book, quite convincingly speaking its artistic truth within the context of that landmark volume, I always felt that I might take the image just one step further and include actual annotations: labels, leader lines and some copy to make it a truly believable explanatory artwork, standing on its own without the need for the book. This is where Wendy Mensink came in: dyed-in-the-wool space enthusiast and accomplished graphic designer, she and I created the annotated version which now stands alongside the pure-image original. Thanks to Wendy’s work, there now is a choice for the space-and-film buff or 2001: A Space Odyssey fan as to which version to favour. My advice would be for those who cannot decide: have them both and frame them side by side. It’ll be a hard-to-beat feature in any environment." Void & Visual collaborated with artist Oliver Rennert to create the annotated version, offering a choice between pure-image and labeled editions. Together, they brought a new level of detail to this tribute to Kubrick’s masterpiece. |
The evaluation of the test print by LUP AG in Cologne, Germany.
Photo by Oliver Rennert.
Photo by Oliver Rennert.