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The photo "The first human-taken color photograph of Earthrise" by William Anders from 1968 shows the globe as seen from space
Photo: picture alliance / dpa / NASA / Ketterer Kunst GmbH
The first photo ever taken by a person on the moon showed a garbage bag of all things.
Neil Armstrong did it in 1969 with his Hasselblad camera and part of the Apollo 11 lunar module can be seen in the background.
Armstrong took many photos on the famous Apollo mission, as did many other space travelers after him.
Such space photos from the beginnings of space travel will be auctioned online from June 20th by the auction house Ketter Kunst.
The 377 original recordings from the collection of Victor Martin-Malburet from Paris were made between 1958 and 1972 - not at the time of Apollo 11.
Astronauts like Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin or John Glenn had photographed themselves as well as the breathtaking views of the moon and earth.
Many of the recordings commissioned by the US space agency Nasa are iconic, such as the footprint in the dust of the moon.
The auction house Ketterer Kunst in Munich speaks of the artistic legacy of the pioneers in space: »The photos capture the moment in which science fiction becomes reality«.
Victor Martin-Malburets has collected more than 3000 photos, also through contacts with the space travelers and their families.
"Astronauts were probably the most daring photographers of all time," is how he explains his fascination.
"From their little-protected space capsules and suits, they skillfully captured sensational views that awe and astonish to this day." It is a world of absolute clarity, colorless, only with shades of gray.
Joystick of the Apollo spaceship
The German physicist Ulf Merbold also took a lot of photos on his missions into space, even if officially he didn't really have the time.
"I sacrificed several hours of my free time every day to look out and take photos," he writes in the online catalog for the auction.
He particularly appreciates the views of the globe from a distance because they make the vulnerability of the globe clear: “These images transform our large planet into what it actually is: a small spaceship called Earth.
That shakes the deeply rooted views that we humans have. "
Astronauts' objects have been auctioned more frequently: Most recently, the joystick with which Neil Armstrong steered the Apollo spacecraft to the moon in the summer of 1969 came under the hammer.
The device changed hands for the equivalent of around 324,000 euros.
Buzz Aldrin's joystick, which hit the surface after Armstrong, fetched $ 256,000.
Armstrong's collection, who died in 2012, also went under the hammer, including his lunar suit, which brought in almost $ 110,000.
joe / dpa