Park City’s Uplift Aerospace partners with Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin in rocket launch

Blue Origin New Shepard Rocket. Photo: Blue Origin

PARK CITY, Utah — Uplift Aerospace, a firm based in Park City (at Kiln in Kimball Junction) and led by a University of Utah graduate, recently collaborated with Blue Origin, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ privately-funded space company.

Uplift Aerospace is pioneering systems to manufacture, trade, and deliver products for a multiplanetary economy. By sourcing materials from space and manufacturing off-planet, Uplift is working to ensure Earth’s precious resources are conserved for a sustainable future.

The inaugural rocket launch of the ‘Suborbital Triptych’ art series propelled a specially commissioned work of art by renowned Ghanaian artist Amoako Boafo on August 26. The work of art was commissioned by Uplift Aerospace.

 

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The launch was conducted at Blue Origin’s facility near Van Horn, Texas.

The ‘Suborbital Triptych’ series is a collaboration between Uplift Aerospace and Blue Origin. Its the first of many initiatives of the Uplift ‘Art x Space’ Program, which is curated by Magnet Empyrean and its founder Jill Clark.

On the morning of August 26, Blue Origin’s reusable suborbital rocket ‘New Shephard’ traveled into space with the specially commissioned triptych by Boafo on the top of the crew capsule on the main chute covers.

“We’re honored to fly Amoako’s works of art to space and back on board New Shepard,” said Erika Wagner on behalf of Blue Origin. “His stunning portraits capture Black joy and the kind of shared future we hope to create for us all in space: vibrant, beautiful, and full of wonder.”

Boafo is the first artist from Africa to have created an artwork propelled into space.

“I’m inspired by the idea that this incredible artwork will be lit by distant galaxies, with Earth as a backdrop,” said Josh Hanes, CEO of Uplift Aerospace. “I hope this will allow viewers a closer connection with the cosmos and the precious planet we call home.”

“A self-portrait looking up to the skies best explains what this project means to me,” said Boafo. “I grew up knowing the sky was the limit and now I get to work on a project that goes beyond the sky as we know it. This signifies what is possible when creatives like myself are given the chance to not only break the glass ceiling but go above it.”

Boafo worked with a special high-grade paint that can sustain the voyage into space. He had to wear a nose mask the entire time he was working on the project because of the paint’s unusually strong smell.