The all-knowing cloud and the cloud of unknowing

As a young adult I enrolled in an introductory astronomy course. I worried that it would require a lot of advanced math, but the challenge proved to be more of a conceptual nature. No matter how I tried, I couldn’t seem to wrap my head around what was being taught about the incomprehensible sizes and distances of stars, nebulas, galaxies, and light-years.

The images from the James Webb Space Telescope have rekindled that sense of wonder in me. The official website displays these images in high definition, providing an immersive experience that was once impossible. Viewing those radiant hues, ethereal glows, and swirls of cosmic dust brings to mind all the symbolic and spiritual associations that clouds inspire: transience, change, unpredictability, mystery, inspiration, and dreamlike states. In scripture, clouds signify divine presence: God guides the Israelites in a pillar of cloud or makes the clouds his chariot, and it’s certainly something to imagine Jesus being received by a cloud after appearing to his disciples following his resurrection.

Georgia O’Keeffe was in her 70s when she traveled by plane for the first time. Looking out her window, the painter was astounded by the vast expanse of cloud-filled sky, its horizon extending boundlessly into the distance. Returning to her studio in New Mexico, she began translating this experience into a series of paintings unlike any she had made before.