With his work, Cuttica will make the dream of traveling to the stratosphere come true.

Very soon, the work of a renowned Argentine artist will travel to the stratosphere from Argentine soil. It will be launched aboard a domestically produced rocket. It's hard to believe, but it's just weeks away from making this a reality, connecting technology with art.

Visual artist Eugenio Cuttica will send Luna, the unique translucent girl of just nine years old perched on a chair that he usually depicts in most of his paintings, to the island once the domestically manufactured TLON Space rocket launches. "The launch will be from the Malacara Spaceport, an aerospace station owned by Tlon Space," explains Pablo Vic, CEO of this Argentine startup in the sector. The station is located in Lobería, 62 kilometers from Necochea.

The Aventura I rocket will carry nanosatellites designed by Space AI , an Argentine company founded in Silicon Valley by entrepreneur Diego Favarolo. In this case, it will launch a constellation of computers into low orbit, meaning not so far from Earth. "This is a very important moment for the country. With this vehicle, Argentina will be positioned among the ten countries in the world with independent access to space," Favarolo celebrates.

Tlon Space, which honors the story "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" by J.L. Borges (in Ficciones) , is not the first Argentine nanosatellite company. The country has had its own love affair with space for decades, dating back to the state-owned Nahuel 1A probe, built abroad, first operated by Nahuelsat and then Ar-Sat, and launched in late 1997. Its useful life ended in 2010, when it was sent into the so-called "graveyard orbit." And at the beginning of this decade, Satellogic, owned by two private investors, became a promising Argentine unicorn. The currency exchange restrictions and exchange controls policy, since 2019, prompted the company to migrate first to Uruguay and then to Spain. It continues its operations today.

Meanwhile, Luna will travel painted on the rocket casing. The girl created by Cuttica is one meter tall and was made of acrylic. She will be displayed in the second stage, on the fuselage of the craft . Once launched, the craft will reach a maximum speed of about 27,000 km/h (about 8 km per second, known as orbital velocity), reaching a minimum altitude of 200 km.

In about seven minutes, the work will be suspended in space. This is an epic event, according to Cuttica. " The rocket is freedom moving forward, " he states. Luna is a bit of the leitmotif of my work and has a symbolic overlay: she is femininity in its purest form, the one we all miss. She is on a bench, exalted on a chair, which is an instrument of power. Her gaze does not rest on matter, but merges with the cosmos." The artist also interprets Luna as a metaphor for the strength and, at the same time, the fragility of the Republic.

What is Tlon Space? The name of this Argentine startup is in honor of the extraordinary "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius," a short story now considered fundamental in speculative fiction and even an inspiration to internet pioneers. This 1943 short story, included in the volume Fictions, postulates the existence of a conjectural world that only survives in one volume , number XI, of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

The company was founded on a patriotic date , May 25, 2005. However, funding began in 2019. "The company has investors who are betting on this technology and Argentina's ability to excel globally. Hence the name Tlon; Borges conceived a literary genre from the Río de la Plata to the world," says Pablo Vic.

The Argentine rocket is 11 meters long and made of carbon fiber, an ultralight, durable, high-performance material. This prevents the craft from being destroyed during the ascent phase through the atmosphere. It weighs less than 100 kilograms, with the fuel load weighing a ton. Aventura I is made up of two segments: the first travels from the Malacara Spaceport to an altitude of 40 km. From then on, the second segment will separate a piece of the vehicle through an interconnection system called the interstage (connecting two stages). From an altitude of 40 km, the second segment of the block transports the payload to orbit, experts explain. By then, without precise timing, Cuttica's paint will have dissolved due to the heat and erosion of the flight .

“Orbits are set at altitudes between 200 and 800 kilometers, depending on the customer's needs. The process takes approximately seven minutes, from takeoff to injection. The vehicle completes its launch at a speed of 27,000 km/h,” Vic commented. The second stage includes the orbit with the satellites, which will be ejected through the “canister,” a key component attached to the top of the vehicle.

After the second stage, the spacecraft will perform an orbital maneuver to enter and burn up in the upper atmosphere. " The satellites will remain orbiting at 8 km per second in a permanent orbit ," he added.

The Aventura I rocket has already completed ten flights as part of a development program, completing the various design stages. It carries four cameras: two on the inside and two on the outside. The first of seven planned launches from Puerto Malacara will be filmed with video cameras and drones. Its trajectory can also be followed through a website specially designed for this mission, with a date to be confirmed: "Moon in Space."

On August 23, 2024, artist Eugenio Cuttica received the " National Deputy Dr. Juan Bautista Alberdi Honorable Mention" in the Chamber of Deputies of the National Congress for his contribution to culture and republican values; he was the first artist to receive it. And now his creation will soar high. "I'm proud that they invited me and that the rocket bears this image, linked to transcendence and the country," said the artist, who drew more than 100,000 people to the retrospective "The Inner Look" at the National Museum of Fine Arts in 2015.

Cuttica concludes on a note of libertarian optimism and support: “My work is to help people understand the meaning of this from another perspective. And in this poetic act, seeking to transcend the boundaries of space and the philosophy of art, I emphasize that it occurs with the new winds that blow. Without them, this would not be possible.”