Moonlight on Five Suns is a series of drawings by Amélie Bouvier, inspired by damaged 19th-century glass plate photographs from the archives of the Observatoire de Paris. These early astronomical images, once used to capture solar activity, now show visible signs of deterioration: cracked glass, peeling emulsions, missing portions of image. This work is inspired by one of the many boxes of glass plates in the archive.

Rather than seeking to repair or idealize these records, Bouvier draws them with great precision and care. Each work centers the Sun, echoing the structure of the original photographs, yet every image bears the physical traces of time. Some are interrupted by fractures or stains, others are partially reconstructed from what has been lost. Through subtle gradations of graphite, the Sun appears both powerful and ephemeral, suspended within a delicate surface stained by human touch.
This series reflects Bouvier’s ongoing interest in the fragility of scientific archives and the ways they are shaped by material decay, human error and the passage of time. By treating each blemish as part of the image’s history, she transforms fragments of the past into meditations on the limits of vision and the endurance of observation.