In 1797, John Russell unveiled The Face of the Moon, a mesmerising chalk and pastel rendering of the full lunar disc. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Russell approached astronomy not as a casual interest but as a fervent devotion. His close friendship with royal astronomer William Herschel and meticulous nightly observations allowed him to capture the Moon’s surface with astonishing accuracy.
The piece wasn’t merely decorative—it was scientific. Russell recorded crater positions, shadow contours, and even wrote his own treatise on lunar cartography. One can only imagine the patience required to track the waxing and waning moonlight from his rooftop observatory in London. Today, this pastel remains one of the most scientifically valuable artistic records of the 18th-century night sky.
