Receiver

Apple, Inc.
Public Art
Sunnyvale, CA
6' x 12' x 5"
2011

Tilting slightly towards the building, the sculpture shape is derived from a section of the parabolic antenna at the nearby Onizuka Air Force Station in Sunnyvale which is the site of the “Blue Cube”. Ellison Onizuka was one of the astronauts on the Challenger space shuttle. The department of defense renamed the Air Force Station in his honor after the Challenger disaster. The glass pattern in the sculpture matches the actual star pattern in the sky above Sunnyvale on January 28, 1986, at 11:38am, the time of the Challenger lift-off. An ellipse shape is used for the brightest stars in the sky. The ellipses are arranged in a concentric circle around the north star.