One Giant Leap for Mankind: Vintage Photographs from the Victor Martin-Malburet Collection 
28 October 2022
One Giant Leap for Mankind: Vintage Photographs from the Victor Martin-Malburet Collection 
255

Buzz Aldrin posing for a photograph beside the US flag, Neil Armstrong [Apollo 11], 16-24 July 1969

printed 1969
vintage chromogenic print on fiber-based Kodak paper 10 h × 8 w in (25 × 20 cm)
estimate: $3,000–5,000
result: $3,000
own a similar item?
free evaluation

In one of the 20th century’s most iconic images, Aldrin poses with the American flag at Tranquility Base.
'A Kodak Paper' watermarks to verso. [NASA image AS11-40-5875]

note: Media visuals referencing the original NASA photograph(s) not included.
literature: Time, 8 August 1969, pg. 21 Space: A History of Space Exploration in Photographs, Chaikin, pg. 53 Apollo: The Epic Journey to the Moon, Reynolds, ppg. 2-3 Apollo Expeditions to the Moon (NASA SP-350), Cortright, ed., pg. 214

print
Time, 8 August 1969, pg. 21

In one of the 20th century’s most iconic images, Aldrin posed with the American flag at Tranquility Base.

Aldrin’s face is visible through his helmet as he looks over at Neil Armstrong. This is one of the few Apollo lunar surface photographs where it is possible to distinguish the astronaut’s face.

Normally, the high reflectivity of the gold visor would block visibility but in this case “his face is directly illuminated by the sunlight from the front and at a right angle to the observer’s point of view, so it literally shines through the visor, especially because he’s sticking his head forward” (ALSJ caption for AS11-40-5875).               

“To be able to look at that American flag and know how much so many people had put of themselves and their work into getting it where it was. We sensed, we really did, this almost mystical unification of all the people in the world at that moment.”

—Buzz Aldrin (LIFE, 22 August 1969, pg. 26)

255