Play, from the series, Alien Landscape, 2011
Shop, from the series, Alien Landscape, 2011
Lounge, from the series, Alien Landscape
Cruise, from the series, Alien Landscape
In the photographic series Alien Landscape, Indianapolis-based artist Brian McCutcheon features himself with his 8-year-old son, Angus. The 2011 photos Cruise, Lounge, Play, and Shop, take as their point of departure the historic NASA mobility studies through which, prior to departing for space missions, astronauts would practice on Earth in preparation for life in orbit. Alien Landscape bizarrely and amusingly reverses this scenario. Instead of showing real astronauts in simulated space situations, the photographs depict the father and son dressed in handcrafted space suits as astronauts, going through the motions of mundane daily life in Indiana. They turn up in real settings such as a country roadside, a supermarket parking lot, a La-Z-Boy showroom, and a front lawn. McCutcheon is not native to Indianapolis and explains: “I'm taking a humorous look at what I've become. It's like, 'Here I am, I'm an adult. I'm in this weird alien landscape I thought I'd never be part of (both as a parent and Midwesterner) and there is both a sense of beauty and loss to that realization.'"
– Brian McCutcheon (Indianapolis, IN)