The work “space launcher” shows an Ariane 5 rocket in the Final Assembly Building at the Centre Spatial Guyanais (CSG), Europe´s spaceport located in French Guiana. Ariane 5 is a heavy lift launch vehicle that forms part of the Ariane rocket family, an expendable launch system used to deliver payloads into geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) or low Earth orbit (LEO). Inside the 90-meter-tall Assembly Building the launcher receives its payload, which is transferred by a traveling crane for installation atop the rocket. In this picture it´s carrying the multi-mission satellite Eutelsat 65 West A with a mass of 6,500kg. The upper stage of the rocket is fueled in the Final Assembly Building. Once integration is complete, the mobile launch table with its rocket is rolled out to the launch zone by the “Titan” truck. Ariane 5 VA229 successfully boosted the Eutelsat 65 West A satellite to its geosynchronous transfer orbit on March 9, 2016.

The artwork “space launcher” shows the enormous complexity of the assembly structure needed to build the relatively simple form of the launcher vehicle – which is basically a tube. The composition of the work refers to the multi-stage assembly process that takes place on various vertical and horizontal levels. The original photograph has been alternated to emphasize technical and constructive precision and the fact that assembly construction and the launcher itself form one single entity.