Kaiser-panorama, de "Màgic 3D"

The Kaiser-panorama, or Panorama de l'Emperador, was a fascinating visual entertainment medium of the late 19th and early 20th centuries that can be considered a true precursor of modern cinema halls and virtual reality. It was invented by the German physicist and entrepreneur August Fuhrmann around the 1880s. Physically, it consisted of a very large, cylindrical wooden cabinet with about twenty-five seats arranged around it. At each seat there was a binocular viewer that used stereoscopic photography, that is, two images taken from slightly different angles that, when viewed together, created a striking illusion of depth in three dimensions.The experience for the viewer was highly structured and immersive. Inside the cylinder, a rotating mechanism passed glass slides illuminated from behind. While the audience looked through the viewer, a small bell rang every few seconds to warn that the image was about to change and move on to the next seat. This allowed people of the middle class to enjoy a kind of parlour tourism before moving motion pictures existed. It showed collections of images about exotic countries, scientific expeditions, natural disasters, distant cities and major historical events.Fuhrmann was so successful that he went on to create a network of branches across central Europe, exchanging collections from an archive that exceeded one hundred thousand photographs. However, with the gradual popularisation of cinema from the 1910s and 1920s onwards, the Kaiser-panorama progressively lost its audience until it almost completely disappeared. Today, only a few original examples of those large cylindrical cabinets remain working in some museums around the world, mainly in Germany and Austria.In this exhibition we present a reproduction of the "Kaiser-Panorama", made by the 3D Màgic Club, of this cabinet for stereoscopic viewing. Its dimensions are smaller than those of the original installations, as it only has room for twelve people. It is, however, unique in Catalonia and possibly in Spain. It will be complemented by a stereoscopic viewing column.Coordination: Enric Riera.