Contact// "1420 Megahertz Hydrogen Line" Original Papercut

This original papercut is composed from three pages of Carl Sagan’s Contact.

At the centre of the novel is the possibility of receiving something from beyond ourselves — a signal emerging from noise, carrying information across an almost unimaginable distance.

This work takes that idea literally.

Three separate pages have been hand cut to isolate fragments of text. Read together, the surviving words form a single line:

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”

The gaps between the pages become part of the composition. The sentence has to cross those spaces, moving from one page to another in much the same way that a signal has to cross an immense distance before it can be understood.

Across each page, the remaining text is interrupted by a cut waveform. It passes through the book rather than sitting on top of it — a visual signal running through Sagan’s own words.

The three pages are mounted against a black background, allowing the cut areas to become dark interruptions within the text and giving the waveform the appearance of something being detected within the page.

Hand cut from three pages of Carl Sagan’s Contact.

This work is the only hand-cut instance of the composition, made directly from specific pages of the text.

A small studio edition may be developed from this work at a later date, derived from the original and produced through a separate, fixed process.

Artwork is A3 in size (297mm x 420mm).
Cut from 3 book pages.

Unframed.

Unframed works are supplied in a simple acrylic presentation frame for protection and display.

Please allow approx. 10 days for frraming and delivery