The Golden Sun Viewmaster was used to watch the 2024 total solar eclipse in Ontario, Canada.

This ceremonial object uses the remnant magic from a nostalgic toy that was originally used by children to look at other worldly images with the help of a light source. (This model L Viewmaster held a wheel of stereoscopic stills from Michael Jackson's Thriller when I found it.) The toy was modified by replacing the diffuser with a solar viewing filter making it safe for the user to look at the sun and rendering the object useful only on a few rare days; the days of total solar eclipse. The elevation of the object from banal to ritual is signaled with gold leaf. (Actually real bronze leaf collected in the Peruvian mountain city of Cusco.) The gilding makes visible the beautiful design and material of the toy that is normally obscured by nostalgic whimsy signaled by the aesthetic of the object.

The device made possible an otherworldly experience, when day became night and a black hole appeared through the sun. The euphoria I felt in the few minutes of the eclipse is forever held inside this object. It is a reliquary of experience.

The obsidian lens was collected from the Pyramid of the Sun near Mexico City and used to watch the solar eclipse from a trampoline on Snaggy Mountain in North Carolina.

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Alexis has always sot out opportunities to see the miraculous through scientific devices and special ceremony like star parties where astronomers lead guided tours of the sky with their telescopes and pilgramages to see rare celestial events like eclipses and northern lights.

Her favorite celestial  phenomenon is the glory, a common occurrence of a rainbow around the viewers shadow only visible from above the clouds. When booking flights Alexis always calculates where a glory might be and reserves a window seat on the corresponding side of the plane.

On this page:

Golden Sun Viewmaster, 2024

Gucci Eclipse Glasses, 2024

Obsidian Occultation Goggle, 2017

Glory Goggle, 2015