Tuesday 3 December 2013

Victoriana and the Telectroscope

There are still a few days left to catch Guildhall Art Gallery's Victoriana exhibition, which ends on 8 December. I finally visited today, and enjoyed it very much. The works are not from the nineteenth century, but rather demonstrate The Art of Revival: contemporary pieces with Victorian inspiration. 

As well as a host of media - taxidermy, letterpress, engravings, colourful ceramics, kinetic sculptures and a zoetrope-inspired installation - there is a strong steampunk current running through much of the work on display. There are also plenty of major names: Yinka Shonibare is inspired by The Picture of Dorian Gray, Paula Rego by Jane Eyre. The work of Paul St George is fun, and partly takes up the themes explored in his Telectroscope which linked London and New York in 2008. In fact, it was the first thing I blogged about - as a taste of his work, here it is again. 

Telectroscope

Earlier this week, I went to City Hall to look at/through the telectroscope, an art installation which is on the riverbank until Sunday. The story is:
Hardly anyone knows that a secret tunnel runs deep beneath the Atlantic Ocean. In May 2008, more than a century after it was begun, the tunnel has finally been completed. An extraordinary optical device called a Telectroscope has been installed at both ends which miraculously allows people to see right through the Earth from London to New York and vice versa.
Okay, something tells me this might not really be done by a long, long tunnel and some mirrors. Nonetheless, you truly can see New Yorkers at the other end (by Brooklyn Bridge) in real time - there were some very excited people waving at friends when I was there - and it's a fun idea. See it in lots more detail on the website.
 
 
 

9 comments:

HughB said...

After that interesting prologue, I've been waiting excitedly for the first chapter of "Victoriana and the Telectroscope" to appear. If the author has suffered writer's block, perhaps we should all take turns to write a chapter - it seems a shame to waste such a splendid title!

CarolineLD said...

Oh yes, perfect for a steampunk novel! You're very welcome to start...

Ralph Hancock said...

What a good idea. Here is my suggestion for a first chapter.

Hugh's Footnote said...

Not sure about setting up links, but I've had a bash at Chapter 2.This Link might get you there?

Ralph Hancock said...

Hooray, looking forward to reading it.

The link didn't work, though. It's hard to give instructions on how to make a link in a comment, because if the link works you can't see it. In the text below, change the four curly brackets to angle brackets (the symbols on the shifted , and . keys). Substitute your URL for the one given, keeping the quote marks and making sure there are no spaces . Just before the final {/A} add the word(s) you want to appear in the text to form the visible link.

{A HREF="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVn9xu86MvY"}Little Grebes{/A}

There is a space after the opening {A. The link does not produce spaces before or after it, so add these in the plain text at either side.

You can also simply write the URL as plain text. It won't work as a link in Blogger (though it does in Wordpress), but people can copy and paste it.

HughB said...

How very odd - the link worked for me when I just tried it - but here's the URL:http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=3302080406555002843#editor/target=post;postID=7665120969283213011;onPublishedMenu=posts;onClosedMenu=posts;postNum=0;src=postname

Ralph Hancock said...

It worked because it was a link to your own blog and you were logged into it. It doesn't work for anyone else. I have a Blogger blog too, so I can tell you what to do. Open your blog for normal viewing. On the post where you have put Chapter 2, click on the time at the bottom; e.g. where it says 'Posted by [your name] at 09.45', click on '09.45'. This will switch the view to one showing this page only. Copy the URL shown at the top of your browser. This will be accessible to the public, and can be given here as a link (or in plain text).

Apologies, Caroline, for using your comments as a lecture theatre.

HughB said...

I've set up a new site on Simplesite.com as I got very confused trying to find my way around Blogger.
This molotok.simplesite.com seems a bit more user-friendly.
I will try that out, though, Ralph - thanks for the help!
Come on Caroline, your turn for a chapter! :)

CarolineLD said...

No problem, and thank you both!

Here's Hugh's chapter two.