Category Archives: Pre-cinema optical devices

Camera Obscura

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camera obscura2The Graphic Arts Collection’s portable camera obscura.

camera obscura3There are a surprising number of events this spring related to the camera obscura.

A temporary installation “Camera Obscura/Gowanus,” produced by The Vanderbilt Republic and created by George Del Barrio and Ashton Worthington, ends this weekend. The installation is described by the pair as a “3,000-square-foot epistemic machine powered by the sun, capturing an ephemeral Brooklyn panorama and personal moment in time.” Del Barrio and Worthington transformed a loft on 9th Street into a building-size camera obscura, projecting inverted live images on the walls.

DSCN4774 (2)At the bottom of the inverted image, you can see the F train passing outside the building.

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Two workshop are being held in March, which will help you build your own camera obscura. The first, titled Vanitas, Fleeting Time, with artist Amy-Claire Huestis will be held on Saturday, March 5th, from 12:00 to 5:00 at Morbid Anatomy Museum, 424 Third Avenue, 11215 Brooklyn. Tickets: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2492722. They write, “A glimpse through the 17th century eye. Be fascinated as you look into the little screen of your own portable camera obscura this hands-on workshop provides a lively experience with history in a hands-on exploration of optical media used in Western European Painting.”

The second workshop, called Domestic Obscura, with Liz Sales will begin at noon on Saturday, March 12, 2016. “This free workshop will take a quick look at the history, theory, and practice of the camera obscura. Together you will create a camera obscura projected onto a large screen at Booklyn.” This event was organized in conjunction with Qiana Mestrich’s exhibition Hard to Place. Booklyn, 37 Greenpoint Avenue, Brooklyn http://booklyn.org/

Finally, the international Camera Obscura Project will be involved in further exhibitions and off-site projects with the Kamloops Art Gallery and the University of Lethbridge’s Art Gallery in 2016. More information on this project coming soon: http://www.midnightsuncameraobscura.com/index.html

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How to Build an Automaton

mechique4http://rbsc.princeton.edu/pathebaby/node/2286

 

mechiquePathe-Magazine Revue Universelle des Sciences, Arts, Industries, Voyages, & Sports, No. 38

Approximately 1 1/2 minutes into this newsreel, there is a segment on the building of an automaton. The title frames are held for a long time but you can stop the film to see the actual work on the figure.

Title frames transcribed for that section:
The Art of Mechanics. Automated Mannequins. The body of the mannequin is first modeled by the artist then molded in a plaster mold. A complicated mechanism gives the impression of life. The anatomy of the smoker. The machine produces smoke. A perfected subject.
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Les Déboires d’un piéton

pathe23http://rbsc.princeton.edu/pathebaby/node/2895

Les Déboires d’un piéton (The troubles of a pedestrian) French silent movie, 1922. Drawn by Lortac and Landelle. Pathe Baby Collection, Princeton University Library.

Transcribed title frames:
The troubles of a pedestrian. Animated cartoons by Lortac and Landelle. Sir prepares himself to tour on his feet the property. Pouah! the horror!… Boor! Reckless driver!. The driver, hurt by the insult, decides to run-over the pedestrian to teach him a lesson. Ah! you will not get me, miserable crusher! I dodged the bullet! Moral of the story: Avoid drivers who drive like madmen, but if you are scared you’d better stay at home. The end.

pathe22This is a rare animated short by the French artist and filmmaker Robert Collard (1884-1973), who used the pseudonym Lortac. Collard established the first organized animation studio, Publi-Ciné, in Montrouge around 1919, working with a number of collaborators. For more see Giannalberto Bendazzi, Animation: A World History: Volume I: Foundations – The Golden Age (2015). Here is a good biography of Collard: http://www.lips.org/bio_Lortac_GB.html

This is one of nearly 800 French silent movies that have been digitized and can be viewed online at http://rbsc.princeton.edu/pathebaby/
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Petite visionneuse

visionneuse1Thanks to the help of Professor Rubén Gallo, the Graphic Arts Collection acquired a small peep show viewer, ca. 1865, mounted with 12 miniature albumen silver photographs. The pyramid shaped device has a monocular lens at the front through which one views the photographs. A moveable lid can be raised to let in light. The 12 prints are sewed to a panoramic strip of cloth that is rotated by two copper buttons.
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The viewer or visionneuse comes originally from a maison close or brothel in Paris. The images, no more than 3 cm, are of a nude man and woman in various erotic poses, not unlike something you might find today on the internet. Small enough to be held in the palm of your hand, the device could easily be passed secretly from one man to another for their viewing pleasure.

For more about the history of prostitution in 19th century Paris, see the exhibition and catalogue for “Splendor and Misery: Images of Prostitution 1850-1910,” at the Musée d’Orsay. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/22/arts/design/splendor-and-misery-images-of-prostitution-captures-a-profession-in-paris-through-artists-eyes.html?_r=0

Persistence of Vision

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thaumatrope        thaumatrope2recto and verso
20151007_151834_resizedAnne McCauley’s ART 589, “Seminar in 19th-Century Photography: Inventing Photography” visited the graphic arts collection recently. Among other things, the students were introduced to the concept of ‘persistence of vision’ by handling 19th-century thaumatropes.

A thaumatrope is a small disc you hold by two pieces of string. An image is printed or drawn on each side of the disc and when you spin it between your fingers, the two images appear to become superimposed. These “turning wonders” are credited to the London physicist, John Ayrton Paris who brought them to the public’s attention around 1825.

How to make a thaumatrope:
http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Thaumatrope
See also J.H. Brown, Spectropia; or, surprising spectral illusions. Showing ghosts everywhere, and of any color. First Series (London: Griffith and Farran; H. & C. Treacher, Brighton. 1864). Cotsen Children’s Library (CTSN) English 19 18457
 

Endless Labor Day

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mouse17From the Graphic Arts Collection of contemporary phenakistoscope discs, an early animation toy based on the persistence of vision.

A Modern Myriopticon

sternehttp://www.laurencesternetrust.org.uk/myriorama/

Between the Cotsen Children’s Library and the Graphic Arts Collection, Princeton holds a number of original 19th century Myrioramas and Myriopticans in its vaults.
https://graphicarts.princeton.edu/2015/03/27/polyorama-or-endless-changes-of-landscapes/
http://rbsc.princeton.edu/file/myriopticonjpg

An online version has been commissioned from the contemporary illustrator Tom Gauld, in conjunction with “Sentimental Landscapes,” an exhibition of Myriopticons at the Shandy Hall Gallery in Coxwold, United Kingdom. This is the home of writer Laurence Sterne (1713-1768), author A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy, and so, a perfect location for a series of endless landscapes. Give it a try.

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Wanted: Princeton Alumni in Hong Kong Who Like Pizza


Pizza Hut Hong Kong is marketing a pizza box that comes with a lens and doubles as a projector. It is (currently) only available in China and so, if anyone is in contact with a Princeton University alumnus who could acquire one for our optical devices collection, please get in touch. No pizza need be shipped.

The company writes: The BlockBuster Box comes with a lens that can be found in the plastic table used to keep the top of the box from touching your pizza. You simply need to punch out the perforated hole on the side of the box, insert the lens and position your smartphone in the middle of the box (with the plastic frame of the table) so that the lens can magnify your screen. Watch the promotional video above.

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Polyorama or Endless Changes of Landscapes

polyorama or endless changes

polyorama or endless changes3 Polyorama or, Endless changes of landscapes (London: Hodgson & Company, [ca. 1824]). 16 hand colored lithographed cards forming an interchangeable panoramic landscape view. Graphic Arts Collection 2015-in process

The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired an early lithographic Polyorama, which presumably follows the success of John Clark’s Myriorama. The cards are printed by the English firm Hodgson & Company, which published a number of lithographic landscape views during the 1820s.

‘The formulaic nature of the picturesque landscape had become, by the nineteenth century, a visual cliché, so much so that it was fashioned by John Clark into a children’s game called the Myriorama, a Collection of Many Thousand Landscapes in 1824. Clark followed this first Myriorama of English-like scenery with a second series composed of Italian scenery which made explicit the classical, Claudean antecedents of Gilpin’s picturesque formula. As the suffix ‘orama’ suggests, Clark saw his Myriorama as the domestic counterpart to those large-scale popular landscape amusements, the panorama and diorama.’ –Ann Bermingham, Learning to Draw: Studies in the Cultural History of a Polite and Useful Art (London: Paul MellonCentre, 2000): 107–08.

According to an advertisement in the Bristol Mercury of 17th May 1824, the views were by the Irish artist Frederick Calvert (c.1785–c.1845), who specialized in seascapes and landscapes, and later, also published a series of 39 plates depicting picturesque views of Staffordshire and Shropshire.

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See also Ralph Hyde, “Myrioramas, Endless Landscapes: The Story of a Craze,” Print Quarterly, December 2004.

Anamorphic Images

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verne anamorphicThe class HUM 598/ENG 547/ART 569, Humanistic Perspectives on the Arts: Drawing and the Line in Literature and the Visual Arts visited the Graphic Arts Collection yesterday to view some of our many anamorphic prints and devices.

Here is one example by Istvan Orosz, Ile mysterieuse [Mysterious Island], 1983. Anamorphic etching. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2003.00001. Gift of anonymous donor.

The print holds a hidden image of the author, Julies Verne (1828-1905) within a setting from his fictional landscape.

A bit about this wonderful class: “This course will pursue some of the relations between perceiving, describing and knowing in the humanities and art practice. Studying the creation and meaning of the line in visual art, poetry, and a handful of philosophical texts, we will examine reversible processes of representation and abstraction as we also consider the mimetic and inventive powers of ekphrasis and art writing.”

Here is a video by the Brothers Quay, explaining anamorphosis:

Brothers Quay -1991- De Artificiali Perspectiva, or Anamorphosis (1991), Published on Apr 6, 2013

Anamorphosis is one of the few examples of an “animated documentary.” The 15-minute film, richly laden with detailed English-language narration, actually constitutes a detailed lecture, where Stephen and Timothy Quay use animation to explore the now forgotten 17th and 18th century art form of the title. The Quays reveal how, in that practice, special paintings employ visual distortion to disclose hidden messages and symbols when viewed from different angles. Leszek Jankowski composed the score.