Our inventive ancestors

Nancy, Helena, and I went to the Smith College Art Museum on Friday and saw some amazing photographs by Jerome Liebling. I didn't like all of his work; in fact, much of his nature photography looked like someone altogether differnt took the photos. But his portraits are unnerving and beautiful and capture rich stories in still moments.

Nancy was reminded (by something she saw in another exhibit) of a painter who would travel the Mississippi by boat many years ago, painting the landscape as he went along on long scrolls, which would be shown to audiences interested in the development along the river. Well, I had to find out more about this, and I found something from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_panorama) about moving panoramas -- so cool! John Banvard sketched images along the Mississippi and then painted them onto a scroll billed as three miles long (although it was really only about half a mile long, but still!). Then I found some information about the 360 degree panoramas that preceded this art form (http://newman.baruch.cuny.edu/digital/2003/panorama/new_001.htm). When I was telling Summer and Angie about this earlier today, Nancy and I both remembered a circular room that had a film projected all the way around (this was at Disney World); Nancy had fire trucks racing at her, and I had a bunch of covered wagons coming at me.

In any case, it's interesting to think how awe inspiring those things must have been at the time. And now, when amazing special effects are a dime a dozen, the novelty of these old fashioned moving panoramas might just seem remarkable all over again...