Canvas documentaries : panoramic entertainments in nineteenth-century Australia and New Zealand   Mimi Colligan Published by Melbourne University Press (2002)

Book description

Long before cinema was invented, people went to picture shows. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in Britain, Europe and America they were treated to dramatic pictorial spectacles.

Audiences might be encircled by vast 360-degree canvases, or seated before continuous images drawn across a proscenium, or gathered in amusement parks to watch painted 3-D structures come 'alive' with the explosion of fireworks overhead. The sense of realism was enhanced by back-lighting, running commentaries and props such as real sand and trees.

These spectacular representations of scenery, current events or recent battles abroad were indeed documentaries on canvas--the first travelogues.

The phenomenon of complex circular panoramas and dioramas took root in Australia and New Zealand in the 1850s. They drew enthusiastic crowds, brought good work for local artists, and propagated the glories of empire in all the capital cities they toured.

Canvas documentaries captures the artistic, civic and social preoccupations of the times.
Generously illustrated with paintings, etchings, engravings, mechanical drawings, architectural plans, photographs and advertising material, this beautiful book is a window on the vibrant popular culture of the Victorian era. 

About the Author

Dr Mimi Colligan is an honorary research associate in the School of Political and Social Inquiry, National Centre for Australian Studies, Faculty of Arts, Monash University. She writes on nineteenth-century popular culture, and is the only historian to have made a detailed study of Australasian panoramas. 

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