3-D Universe: A Symphony January 14, 2010

The Adler is proud to present this inspiring musical tour of the universe as one of our special contributions to the International Year of Astronomy, celebrating the 400th anniversary of Galileo's first use of a telescope to explore the skies. This compelling video suite blends breathtakingly beautiful astronomical images with the enchanting musical selection 'Pictures at an Exhibition' composed by Mussorgsky in 1874. In creating this unique sensory experience, Adler Astronomer and artist Dr. Jose Francisco Salgado selected spectacular pictures from observatories around the world, the Hubble Space Telescope, and other NASA and European Space Agency spacecraft. He combined these images with animations produced by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois, NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Adler Planetarium. This is the first time many of these 3-D images have been seen by the public. During the show view may find themselves swooping low across planetary surfaces, drifting through interstellar clouds, spiraling around galactic arms, sweeping past massive black holes, and soaring out among colliding galaxies to the far-reaches of our expanding universe.