The defining moment of Ionel Talpazan’s life occurred when he was a young boy in his native Romania. Escaping into the night forest to avoid being punished by his foster parents, Talpazan was suddenly engulfed by a celestial light, a "blue energy," emanating from an aircraft hovering overhead. This otherworldly event transfixed him, and the possibility of alien technology ultimately became the theme of his many drawings that depict and deconstruct spaceships and unidentified flying objects with detailed descriptions and commentary written in Romanian.

In 1987, Talpazan escaped Romania by swimming across the Danube into what was then Yugoslavia. He lived in a refugee camp in Belgrade, operated by the United Nations, and was eventually granted asylum in the United States, becoming a citizen shortly before his death in 2015. Talpazan struggled in New York, finding it difficult to make ends meet and sometimes living on the street or in subsidized housing. But his vision and mission endured through all and any obstacles. His art was a quest for answers: "My art is about the big mystery in life. How did we get here on earth? Why are we here? Is there life on other planets?" A seeker and traveler, Talpazan used his art to ponder the universe: "My art shows spiritual technology, something beautiful and beyond human imagination, that comes from another galaxy." In this double-sided work, Talpazan has arranged the planets spinning on concentric rings, like a diagram of the heavenly or celestial spheres, as the planetary model of the universe was once conceived.

Stacy C. Hollander, "Untitled, August 4, 2004 (double-sided)," exhibition copy for American Perspectives: Stories from the American Folk Art Museum Collection. Stacy C. Hollander, curator. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2020.