Iconic artist Tom Sachs has adapted his brand-conscious art into feature film A Space Program that centers on a make-believe NASA mission to Mars.

Tom Sachs On A Space Program

In A Space Program, with director Van Neistat at the helm, Sachs creates a mission to Mars through sculpture. The film captures Sachs’ 2012 installation at New York City’s Park Avenue Armory where – among other things – rested a life-sized landing module constructed out of plywood and filled with preparations for space travel, including whiskey and candles.

Sachs brought his project from the gallery to film to allow his sculptures to be fully realized; to show not just what they are, but what they could theoretically do. The New York-based artist is also aware of the extended reach his sculptures will have if they can be viewed in a video that could play on one’s cell phone – and not just in a city gallery.

“The movies are there to show the aspects of the sculpture that exist in time. In other words, a cup on a table doesn’t mean anything until you’ve got water in it, or are drinking out of it. In the same case, a spaceship doesn’t mean anything unless it’s landing on Mars,” Sachs told uInterview in an exclusive interview at SXSW. “So the movie, in a way, is kind of like a propaganda film that shows about how our rituals in the studio work.”

Sachs added, “I’m a sculptor and I live and die to make sculpture, but more people will see images of my sculpture on a 2 ½ inch screen than they’ll ever see in real life, and that’s the reality. You can’t ignore it. That’s the world that we live in, and it’s a fantastic world. It’s a world where I can share my ideas. However, they’re very different in real life than they are in the screen. So, the movies help show, instead of a photograph, how you can move around space and understand it.”

Through his sculpture, Sachs has explored numerous brands that he’s familiar with as a consumer, including Sony, Chevrolet, Nike, Chanel and more. When choosing the brand for this specific art piece, Sachs was in search of a brand that represents humanity, landing on NASA because of its dedication to greater knowledge.

“I thought, what are the real brands? What are the brands that represent humanity? And NASA to me was the icon of all knowledge,” Sachs explained. “It’s science, it’s in a lot of ways faith, it asks the same questions that religion asks: are we alone, and where do we come from? And, in that sense, we go to Mars to study a planet that’s very much like our own.”

Despite NASA playing a major part in A Space Program, Sachs didn’t make the feature because he wanted to offer commentary on the space station. Rather, he wanted to celebrate the nuance of art-making in a studio, which allows for things to be the artist’s own imperfect creations.

“There’s no specific message or agenda for the space program, other than to convey the values of the studio – which are of transparency. I believe that the only real advantage that the artist has over industry is her fingerprints,” Sachs told uInterview. “Apple can never make something as flawed and human as one of my sculptures, but I can’t make anything as perfect as the iPhone. There is a generation of artists that are embracing digital printing, CMC milling, digital technology. The advantage of the individual is that your flaws say, ‘I was here’.