There is a wonderful book about this very thing: “Picturing the Cosmos: Hubble Space Telescope Images and the Astronomical Sublime” — from the description: “Eli

There is a wonderful book about this very thing: “Picturing the Cosmos: Hubble Space Telescope Images and the Astronomical Sublime” — from the description: “Elizabeth A. Kessler examines the Hubble’s deep space images, highlighting the remarkable resemblance they bear to nineteenth-century paintings and photographs of the American West and their invocation of the visual language of the sublime.” https://www.upress.umn.edu/9780816679577/picturing-the-cosmos/ https://www.upress.umn.edu/9780816679577/picturing-the-cosmo...