Reflection
Julia Stephens
December 8th, 2025
Major: Studio Art and Creative Writing
Genre/Medium: Watercolor and ink on paper
About the work:
Reflection is a piece that explores the psyche mission’s goal of discovery in regard to helping understand our own earth’s core and how it parallels the mythical story of Cupid and Psyche. The original myth is about a reveal and discovery of something unknown being close to familiarity and humanity. Psyche is reaching out to Cupid as we are reaching out to this planetesimal. With both the asteroid and the spacecraft living under the title of Psyche, I thought it was fitting that the mission happened to be almost a self-discovery. Psyche is unveiling a secret of herself in a way. We are exploring Psyche to understand more about ourselves. This concept is highlighted in the combination of the asteroid and the spacecraft meshed into one atop a colored background based on the map of the optical albedo of the asteroid which is a measurement of the reflection of sunlight.
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