The Projectionists

Zusatztext

Eadweard Muybridge is among the seminal originators of the contemporary worlds visual form, with its concentrated image-sequences of bodies in movement and its ocular obsessions. This book examines an almost unknown dimension of Muybridges work, as a moving-image projectionist, who toured Europes cities to enthral beyond-capacity audiences with unprecedented projections and who built a moving-image auditorium - long before cinemas were created - in which to project his work at the 1893 Chicago Worlds Columbian Exposition. That final invention of Muybridges was both an all-engulfing catastrophe and the vital precursor for the following centurys worldwide manias for projection. Based on entirely new research into Muybridges travels, audiences, auditoria and projectors, this book explores his initiating role in moving-image projection and also maps Muybridges driving inspiration for subsequent artists and filmmakers preoccupied with the volatile entity of projection, from 1890s Berlin to contemporary Japan, via further spectacular Worlds Exposition events and cinemas overheated projection-boxes. The book looks closely at the enigmatic figure of the moving-image projectionist, from its origins in Muybridges experiments, across glass, celluloid and digital projections, to the contemporary moment. Moving-image projection formed a crucial determinant in the imagining of new corporealities and new urban spaces, through its irrepressible capacity to envision future bodies and cities. The cinema projectionist - a solitary figure of compulsion and restlessness, inhabiting a profession touched with the multiple addictions and deaths of the moving image - was once a pivotal presence for global cinema audiences but is now consigned to near-obsolescence. The book investigates contemporary urban projections as aberrant manifestations derived from Muybridges first conjurations of projections power for its spectators. Throughout, the book interrogates the strange figure of the projectionist, embodied first of all by Muybridge himself. The Projectionists will attract and fascinate all lovers of cinemas, photography and moving-image cultures.

Autorenportrait

Stephen Barber ist Autor von 25 Büchern, darunter sieben Romane. Kürzlich erschienen: White Noise Ballrooms und The Projectionists. Eadweard Muybridge and the Future Projections of the Moving Image. Seine Bücher wurden vielfach ausgezeichnet und in diverse Sprachen übersetzt. The Independent newspaper (London) nannte ihn »den gefährlichsten Mann Europas«.

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