Participatory art

 Participatory art is an approach to making art in which the audience is engaged directly in the creative process, allowing them to become co-authors, editors, and observers of the work. Therefore,this type of art is incomplete without the viewers physical interaction. Its intent is to challenge the dominant form of making art in the West, in which a small class of professional artists make the art while the public takes on the role of passive observer or consumer, i.e., buying the work of the professionals in the marketplace.

Some works on commission, which have made known participatory art, are the theater of Augusto Boal's oppressed and the happenings of Allan Kaprow. An artistic work, which is interactive and participated, can be defined as participatory art and can also be categorized with terms such as relational art, social practice and a new form of public art.Commended works by advocates that popularized participatory art include Augusto Boal in his Theater of the oppressed, as well as Allan Kaprow in happenings.

Participatory arts refers to a range of arts practice, including relational aesthetics, where emphasis is placed on the role of the viewer or spectator in the physical or conceptual realisation and reception of the artwork. The central component of Participatory Arts is the active participation of the viewer or spectator. Many forms of Participatory Arts practice foreground the role of collaboration in the realisation of an artwork, deemphasising the role of the professional artist as sole creator or author of the artwork, while building social bonds through communal meaning and activity. The term Participatory Arts encompasses a range of arts practices informed by social, political, geographic, economic and cultural imperatives, such as community arts, activist art, new genre public art, socially-engaged art and dialogical art.

Participatory Arts can be artform specific, such as visual arts, music or drama, or they can be interdisciplinary involving collaboration across a range of artforms. They can also involve collaboration with non-art agencies, such as social inclusion organisations, local authorities and community development groups. The artwork produced can take many forms and, due to the collaborative nature of Participatory Arts, this may comprise an event, a situation or a Performance, rather than the production of an object. The interactions that emerge from these encounters are often translated into documentary mediums, such as photography, video or text.

Participatory art is a term that describes a form of art that directly engages the audience in the creative process so that they become participants in the event

In this respect, the artist is seen as a collaborator and a co-producer of the situation (with the audience), and these situations can often have an unclear beginning or end.

Subtypes of participatory art:

Photovoice

Comic Book Project

Create a Comic Project

History

Participatory art has its origins in the futurist and dada performances of the early twentieth century, which were designed to provoke, scandalise and agitate the public. In the late 1950s the artist Allan Kaprow devised performances called happenings, in which he would coerce the audience into participating in the experience. The French film-maker and writer Guy Debord, founder of situationism, also promoted a form of participatory art in that he wished to eliminate the spectator’s position by devising industrial paintings: paintings created en masse. The contemporary artist Marvin-Gaye Chetwynd relies entirely on willing participants to create her performances, as does the activist artist Tania Bruguera. In her work Surplus Value, participants were asked to wait in line and then randomly selected into those who could enter the work and others who were submitted to lie detector tests, in order to highlight the problems of immigration.

The emergence of Participatory Arts is informed by earlier avant-garde movements such as dada, constructivism and surrealism, which raised questions with regard to notions of originality and authorship and challenged conventional assumptions about the passive role of the viewer or spectator. In doing so they adopted an anti-bourgeois position on the role and function of art.

The social, political and cultural upheavals of the 1960s and the perceived elitism, social disengagement and commodification of art associated with modernism contributed to new forms of politicised, reactionary and socially engaged practice, such as conceptual art, fluxus and situationism. The development of new technologies and improved mechanisms of communication and distribution, combined with the break down of medium-specific artforms, provided greater possibilities for artists to physically interact with the viewer. New forms of practice were developed by artists, who proactively sought out new artistic mediums to shape mutual exchange through open and inclusive practices. These new forms of practice appropriated non-hierarchical social forms and were informed by a range of theoretical and practical disciplines, such as feminism, postcolonial theory, psychoanalysis, critical theory and literary theory. While questions of authorship raised concerns about who participates in the definition and production of art, the relationship of the artwork to its audience became a central axis for these emerging forms of arts practice.

One of the earliest usages of the term appears in photographer Richard Ross (photographer)'s review for the Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art journal of the exhibition "Downtown Los Angeles Artists," organized by the Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum in 1980. Describing in situ works by Jon Peterson (artist), Maura Sheehan and Judy Simonian anonymously placed around Santa Barbara, Ross wrote, "These artists bear the responsibility to the community. Their art is participatory."

In the late 1990s participatory concepts have been expanded upon by a new generation of artists identified under the heading of relational art or Relational Aesthetics. This is a term coined by the French curator Nicolas Bourriaud to describe a range of open-ended art practices, concerned with the network of human relations and the social context in which such relations arise. Relational Art also stresses the notion of artworks as gifts, taking multiple forms, such as meals, meetings, parties, posters, casting sessions, games, discussion platforms and other types of social events and cooperations. In this context, emphasis is placed on the use of the artwork. Art is regarded as information exchanged between the artist and the viewer which relies on the responses of others to make it relational.

In response to the rapid acceleration of real time communications in the twenty first century a new term, altermodern, also devised by Bourriaud, proposes an alternative to the conceptual lineage of postmodernism. According to Bourriaud, the opening of new market economies and the mobility of artist and audience has stimulated new models for political and cultural exchange and participation. Through global distribution systems, artists can cut across geographic and political boundaries. A new cultural framework consisting of diaspora, migration and exodus offers alternative modes of interpretation and understanding of the artwork. The decentralisation of global culture presents new formats for exchange between artist and audience, which are continually susceptible and adaptable to readily-available technologies. Digital technology and the internet's global social networks can promote a sense of participation without the physical gathering of people in any one location. This represents a fundamental shift in traditional notions of community and our experience of artworks.

Influence:

The presumed authorial control of the artist was challenged in particular by Conceptual artists who placed an emphasis on the idea or concept rather than a tangible art object. They created artworks which could be realised by others without the direct intervention of the artist. Artworks could take the form of a set of instructions, where participants were directly involved in the co-creation of the artwork. Instructions were communicated through a variety of media, such as photography, video, drawing, text, performance, sound, sculpture and installation.

Similarly, Fluxus artists rejected traditional principles of craftsmanship, permanency of the art object and the notion of the artist as specialist. Fluxus artists viewed art not as a finite object but as a time-based experience, employing performance and theatrical experiments. Fluxus artists were interested in the transformative potential of art through collaboration. Spectators were encouraged to interact with the performer, while plotless staged events left artworks open to artistic chance and interpretation. Artworks were realised in a range of media, including musical scores, performances, events, publications, multiples and assembled environments constructed to envelop the observer. These initiatives were often conceived with workshop characteristics, whereby the artist operated as facilitator, engaging the audience in philosophical discussions about the meaning of art. Artworks often took the form of meetings and public demonstrations, happenings or social sculpture, whereby the meaning of the work was derived from the collective engagement of the participants. A common goal of Fluxus, Happenings and Situationist events was to develop a new synthesis between politics and art, where political activism was mirrored in streetbased arts practice as a radical means to eliminate distinctions between art and life.

It is important to point out that there has been some nominal obfuscation of Participatory Art, causing its appreciation as a distinct form to be stymied. It is most likely that this occurred simultaneously with the development of the term "Relational Aesthetics" by Bourriaud in the late 1990s. Some other art making techniques, such as 'community-based art', 'interactive art', or 'socially-engaged art' have been (mis)labelled as Participatory art, simply because the subtleties of distinction are not always clearly understood or cared about. Participatory art requires of the artist that they either not be present, or that they somehow are able to recede far enough to become equal with the participants. This is the only way that participants might be offered the agency of creation; without this detail, participants will always respond within the domain of authority of the artist; they will be subjugated in this way, and the work will fail to be participatory. This detail is centrally important in asserting Participation as a form in itself, and effectively differentiates Participation from interactive, community based art and socially engaged art. Any of these techniques can include the presence of the artist, as it will not impinge upon the outcome of the work in the same way.

Folk and tribal art can be considered to be a predecessor or model for contemporary "participatory art" in that many or all of the members of the society participate in the making of "art". However, the ideological issue of use arises at this point because art made in the institutions of art is by default, already part of the art world, and therefore it's perceived use is entirely different to any ritualistic or traditional practices expressed by folk or tribal groups. As the ethnomusicologist Bruno Nettl wrote, the tribal group "has no specialization or professionalization; its division of labor depends almost exclusively on sex and occasionally on age, and only rarely are certain individuals proficient in any technique to a distinctive degree ... the same songs are known by all the members of the group, and there is little specialization in composition, performance or instrument making.”

In the Fall/Winter issue of Oregon Humanities magazine, writer Eric Gold describes "an artistic tradition called 'social practice,' which refers to works of art in which the artist, audience, and their interactions with one another are the medium. While a painter uses pigment and canvas, and a sculptor wood or metal, the social practice artist often creates a scenario in which the audience is invited to participate. Although the results may be documented with photography, video, or otherwise, the artwork is really the interactions that emerge from the audience's engagement with the artist and the situation."

Participatory or interactive art creates a dynamic collaborati

The development of Participatory Arts practice has also been informed and shaped by the development of public art programmes, many of which evolved in the context of large-scale urban renewal and regeneration initiatives. Participatory Arts programmes with their emphasis on public engagement and participation can be an important element in both the consensus-building process and critique of such regeneration initiatives. The economic downturn and social political turmoil of the 1980s combined with the alienating effects of capitalism and its impact on community structures, resulted in an increasing awareness of the potential of the arts as a vehicle to address social issues, in particular issues of social inclusion. Influenced by earlier forms of socially-engaged and activist art, many Community Arts organisations and initiatives emerged during this period. Community Arts emphasised the role of art in bringing about social aspects of the art initiative were imperative. Dialogical Aesthetics is a term used to describe the active role of dialogue in such socially-engaged art. During this period, state bodies funding the arts began to impose contingencies on their client organisations, such as museums, galleries, theatres and arts organisations, with regard to encouraging public participation in the arts, especially on the part of marginalised or socially excluded constituencies. The utilisation of the arts to address non-arts agendas contributed to an ongoing debate about the role of art and its relationship to its audience, which continues to inform consideration of Participatory Arts today.

Culture has grown to expect instant gratification and an all-access pass by posting feedback and opinions online. We are wholly accustomed to interactivity, and art that reflects such reciprocation and proactive involvement resonates deeply with us. By turning art viewing into an inclusive experience, the artist strengthens our understanding of the piece, and perhaps inspires the visitor to spend a bit longer on each painting or sculpture.

Today’s art museums are wising up to the benefits of interactivity. Many institutions have adapted to the needs of increasingly web-oriented, digitally-minded visitors who expect instant access and involvement both inside and outside museum walls. Such institutions have begun utilizing iPhone apps and social networking to promote events, online galleries to inform those at home, and touch-screen technology to guide perceptions within exhibitions. The savvier museums are also mastering how to define and regulate issues of conserving, displaying, and owning conceptual works that conflate art and audience.

Centrale Montemartini, Roma, Italy

The Centrale Montemartini, on the Via Ostiense, is part of the system of the Museums in the Municipality. It houses about 400 Roman statues, already exhibited at the Capitoline Museums or recovered from the rich municipal deposits, along with epigraphs and mosaics, in an extraordinary setting of industrial archeology.

The history if the new exhibition space for the Musei Capitolini in the former Giovanni Montemartini Thermoelectric Centre, an extraordinary example of industrial archaeology converted into a museum, began in 1997 with the transfer of hundreds of sculptures to the new location during the restructuring works carried out across much of the Capitoline complex.

To create space in the Museum of the Palazzo dei Conservatori, the Museo Nuovo and the Braccio Nuovo, while keeping the works of art accessible to the public, an exhibition was created in 1997 in the restructured rooms of the first public electricity plant in Rome. The exhibition was entitled “The machines and the gods”: it put side by side two diametrically opposed worlds, those of classical art and industrial archaeology. 

In an atmospheric game of contrasts, the old machinery of electricity production became the backdrop for masterpieces of ancient sculpture and precious goods found in the excavations of the late nineteenth century and the 1930s. The display reconstructs some of the great monumental complexes and illustrates the development of the ancient city from the Republican era to the late imperial age. 

The adaption of the building into a museum, the restoration of the machines and the educational sections about industrial archaeology have all been created by ACEA.

The outstanding museum space was originally thought of as a temporary solution. However when part of the sculptural collection was returned to the Campidoglio in 2005, on the conclusion of the restructuring works, it was decided to turn the building into a permanent location for a collection of the Museio Capitolini’s most recent acquisitions.

The space is used for continual experiments in possible display methods, particularly those connected to scientific research on the remains; bringing together works from the same area of provenance also allows the links between the museum and the fabric of the ancient city to be continually renewed.

The museum itself is part of a wider project to redefine the Ostiense Marconi area, converting it into a cultural centre for the oldest industrial area of Rome (including, as well as the electricity plant, the Slaughter House, the Gasometer, structures from the docks, the old Mira Lanza site and the old General Markets), with the defining structure of the university campus of Roma Tre.

Collection
Most of the finds are made up of pieces coming from the excavations carried out after the Unification of Italy, in particular excavations related to the ancient Roman horti. The exhibition system highlights the find area of ​​the finds and is divided into three main themes:

Republican Rome (the religious and funeral sphere, the introduction of luxury in the private sphere, the portraiture), in the "Sala Colonne";

the monumental center of Rome (area of ​​the Flaminio circus, temple of Apollo Sosiano, Campidoglio, sacred area of ​​largo Argentina, theater of Pompeo), in the "Machine Room";

the gardens, the imperial residences and the domus (horti of the Esquiline, horti Sallustiani, horti Spei Veteris in Porta Maggiore, mosaic of Santa Bibiana), in the "Sala Caldaie".

The exhibition is characterized by the intertwining of images of classical archeology and images of industrial archeology, with the machinery of the power station that are the background to the sculptures (or vice versa, according to the observation points inside the hall). Very disturbing is the disturbing presence of the two gigantic and silent Diesel engines of the power plant, each of which is sympathetic to an alternator, all symbols of that century that saw the advent of most of the most extraordinary technologies of the modern era.

Among the statues, two Roman copies of the Skopas Pothos.

Rooms:
Atrium
In the spacious hall of the atrium, on the ground floor, compressed air canisters are lined up on both sides. They were used to work the Diesel engines in the Machine Room above.

History of the Centrale Montemartini
With educational panels giving an exhaustive history of the building from its installation onwards, including period photographs and technical drawings.
Also examining the characteristics of main main machines used.
Throughout the exhibit the individual machines have labels explanatory labels.

The furnishing of the museum
he sculpture of the Musei Capitolini was transfered to the Centrale Montemartini during reconstruction works at the Musei Capitolini complex, so that they could remain on display throughout the period, rather than being put into store.
Several panels describe the various phases of furnishing, including the packing in the Musei Capitolini, the transportation, and the installation in the rooms of the Centrale Montemartini.
There is a particular focus on the movement of many large and heavy pieces of sculpture, achieved using expedient technical solutions.

Hall of Columns
This large hall takes its name from the numerous pillars of reinforced cement which once supported the three boilers in the Boiler Hall on the floor above. 

Several hoppers are also visible in the ceiling, similar to the truncated-pyramidical funnels, which were filled with the cinders from the coal used to feed the boilers. 
A hatch in the lower part of the hoppers allowed the cinders to be recovered, collected in carts and carried on the communal trucks of the Garden Services to be used in the gardens and parks of Rome for drainage.

Hall of the Machines
The size of the two diesel engines present in the room, today completely restored, is impressive. The camshaft of each motor is made from three pieces, whose total weight in 81 tons, and which measure over 20 metres. 

The colossal two-speed motors had a total power of 15.000 HP and were constructed by the Franco Tosi di Legnano Company; they were installed on the 21st April 1933, in the presence of Benito Mussolini. 
A steam turbine is also installed in the room, a genuine antique piece.

Boiler Room
This spacious rectangular room, which measures more than 1000 square metres, is dominated by a huge steam boiler fixed to one of the short walls.

The only survivor of the three boilers originally installed, it rises from the floor to the ceiling ina complex net of tubes, bricks and metal walkways.

Room of the Train of Pius IX (formerly Boiler Room no. 2)
The environment that today is dedicated to the exposition of Pope Pius IX’s train wagons was originally a sector of the Boiler Room n. 2 of the Montemartini thermoelectric plant.

The Boiler Room 2. History and reuse
The design of a second Boiler Room, adjacent to the first of 1912, began in 1921, when it became necessary to equip the production plant with a new Tosi 9000 HP turbo-alternator and its battery of boilers. The contract was entrusted to the Italian Ferrobeton Company and was completed in 1924. The result was a large room, divided into three naves by two rows of high reinforced concrete pillars, with a two-level floor plan, in which three new large steam boilers built by Tosi - Garbe were housed.

The works carried out in 1950 for the expansion of the adjacent Boiler Room no. 1 involved covering the southern front of the building's left aisle and modifying the facade, which took on its current appearance. In 1954, concurrent with the phase of progressive decline of the thermoelectric plant, all the machinery of the Hall were abandoned and sold, while the environment, partially remodelled and divided into two sectors through metal shutters, was reused by Acea, partly as testing laboratory for high voltage power and partly as carpentry. In addition to the bridge crane, the only industrial element that survived the dismantling of the machinery of the Hall is a tank for storing naphtha for the boilers supply, which was originally placed on the trusses of the central corridor, as can be seen from an image of 1924.

After the acquisition of the spaces of the Centrale Montemartini by the Sovrintendenza Capitolina, the southern sector of the former Boiler Room n. 2 has been the subject of complex renovation work, aimed at making it the permanent exhibition site of the carriages of the papal train coming from the Museum of Rome in Palazzo Braschi.

Pope Pius IX’s train 
Giovanni Maria Mastai Ferretti, who became pope on 16 June 1846 taking the name Pius IX, was fully aware of the key role that railways would play in the economic, social and political development of European nations in the immediate future. In 1846, soon after his election, he gave orders for the construction of a series of railways linking Rome to the leading cities of the Papal States.

The papal train was built in 1858 at the initiative of the Pio Centrale and Pio Latina companies, which commissioned them from French companies as a gift for the pope. On 3 July 1859 the Pope made his maiden journey in these luxurious carriages, travelling from the Porta Maggiore train station, the terminus of the papal railways, to Cecchina station, Albano.

Panoramic painting

Panoramic paintings are massive artworks that reveal a wide, all-encompassing view of a particular subject, often a landscape, military battle, or historical event. They became especially popular in the 19th century in Europe and the United States, inciting opposition from some writers of Romantic poetry. A few have survived into the 21st century and are on public display.

The panoramas were in the following form: the viewer was invited to enter the rotunda through a tunnel plunged into darkness. He then debouched in the middle of a circular painting of which he could neither see the top, hidden by a screen, nor the bottom, because of a railing that kept him at a distance from the painting. The light source was likewise masked by the screen. The canvas, about 7 meters high and covering circular walls 17 to 50 meters in diameter, was exhibited most often during exhibitions and circulated from one city to another, or even from one country to another.

In China, panoramic paintings are an important subset of handscroll paintings, with some famous examples being Along the River During the Qingming Festival and Ten Thousand Miles of the Yangtze River.

History:

The word "panorama", from Greek pan ("all") horama ("view") was coined by the Irish painter Robert Barker in 1792 to describe his paintings of Edinburgh, Scotland shown on a cylindrical surface, which he soon was exhibiting in London, as "The Panorama".

In 1793 Barker moved his panoramas to the first purpose-built brick panorama rotunda building in the world, in Leicester Square, and made a fortune.

Viewers flocked to pay a stiff 3 shillings to stand on a central platform under a skylight, which offered an even lighting, and get an experience that was "panoramic" (an adjective that didn't appear in print until 1813). The extended meaning of a "comprehensive survey" of a subject followed sooner, in 1801. Visitors to Barker's Panorama of London, painted as if viewed from the roof of Albion Mills on the South Bank, could purchase a series of six prints that modestly recalled the experience; end-to-end the prints stretched 3.25 metres. In contrast, the actual panorama spanned 250 square metres.

Despite the success of Barker's first panorama in Leicester Square, it was neither his first attempt at the craft nor his first exhibition. In 1788 Barker showcased his first panorama. It was only a semi-circular view of Edinburgh, Scotland, and Barker's inability to bring the image to a full 360 degrees disappointed him. To realize his true vision, Barker and his son, Henry Aston Barker, took on the task of painting a scene of the Albion Mills. The first version of what was to be Barker's first successful panorama was displayed in a purpose-built wooden rotunda in the back garden of the Barker home and measured only 137 square metres.

Barker's accomplishment involved sophisticated manipulations of perspective not encountered in the panorama's predecessors, the wide-angle "prospect" of a city familiar since the 16th century, or Wenceslas Hollar's Long View of London from Bankside, etched on several contiguous sheets. When Barker first patented his technique in 1787, he had given it a French title: La Nature à Coup d' Oeil ("Nature at a glance"). A sensibility to the "picturesque" was developing among the educated class, and as they toured picturesque districts, like the Lake District, they might have in the carriage with them a large lens set in a picture frame, a "landscape glass" that would contract a wide view into a "picture" when held at arm's length.

Barker made many efforts to increase the realism of his scenes. To fully immerse the audience in the scene, all borders of the canvas were concealed. Props were also strategically positioned on the platform where the audience stood and two windows were laid into the roof to allow natural light to flood the canvases.

Two scenes could be exhibited in the rotunda simultaneously, however the rotunda at Leicester Square was the only one to do so. Houses with single scenes proved more popular to audiences as the fame of the panorama spread. Because the Leicester Square rotunda housed two panoramas, Barker needed a mechanism to clear the minds of the audience as they moved from one panorama to the other. To accomplish this, patrons walked down a dark corridor and up a long flight of stairs where their minds were supposed to be refreshed for viewing the new scene. Due to the immense size of the panorama, patrons were given orientation plans to help them navigate the scene. These glorified maps pinpointed key buildings, sites, or events exhibited on the canvas.

To create a panorama, artists travelled to the sites and sketched the scenes multiple times. Typically a team of artists worked on one project with each team specializing in a certain aspect of the painting such as landscapes, people or skies. After completing their sketches, the artists typically consulted other paintings, of average size, to add further detail. Martin Meisel described the panorama perfectly in his book Realizations: "In its impact, the Panorama was a comprehensive form, the representation not of the segment of a world, but of a world entire seen from a focal height." Though the artists painstakingly documented every detail of a scene, by doing so they created a world complete in and of itself.

The first panoramas depicted urban settings, such as cities, while later panoramas depicted nature and famous military battles. The necessity for military scenes increased in part because so many were taking place. French battles commonly found their way to rotundas thanks to the feisty leadership of Napoleon Bonaparte. Henry Aston Barker's travels to France during the Peace of Amiens led him to court, where Bonaparte accepted him. Henry Aston created panoramas of Bonaparte's battles including The Battle of Waterloo, which saw so much success that he retired after finishing it. Henry Aston's relationship with Bonaparte continued following Bonaparte's exile to Elba, where Henry Aston visited the former emperor. Pierre Prévost (painter) (1764–1823) was the first important French panorama painter. Among his 17 panoramas, the most famous describe the cities of Rome, Naples, Amsterdam, Jerusalem, Athens and also the battle of Wagram.

Outside of England and France, the popularity of panoramas depended on the type of scene displayed. Typically, people wanted to see images from their own countries or from England. This principle rang true in Switzerland, where views of the Alps dominated. Likewise in America, New York City panoramas found popularity, as well as imports from Barker's rotunda. As painter John Vanderlyn soon found out, French politics did not interest Americans. In particular, his depiction of Louis XVIII's return to the throne did not live two months in the rotunda before a new panorama took its place.

Barker's Panorama was hugely successful and spawned a series of "immersive" panoramas: the Museum of London's curators found mention of 126 panoramas that were exhibited between 1793 and 1863. In Europe, panoramas were created of historical events and battles, notably by the Russian painter Franz Roubaud. Most major European cities featured more than one purpose-built structure hosting panoramas. These large fixed-circle panoramas declined in popularity in the latter third of the nineteenth century, though in the United States they experienced a partial revival; in this period, they were more commonly referred to as cycloramas.

The panorama competed for audiences most frequently with the diorama, a slightly curved or flat canvas extending 22 by 14 metres. The diorama was invented in 1822 by Louis Daguerre and Charles-Marie Bouton, the latter a former student of the renowned French painter Jacques-Louis David.

Unlike the panorama where spectators had to move to view the scene, the scenes on the diorama moved so the audience could remain seated. Accomplished with four screens on a roundabout, the illusion captivated 350 spectators at a time for a period of 15 minutes. The images rotated in a 73 degree arc, focusing on two of the four scenes while the remaining two were prepared, which allowed the canvases to be refreshed throughout the course of the show. While topographical detail was crucial to panoramas, as evidenced by the teams of artists who worked on them, the effect of the illusion took precedence with the diorama. Painters of the diorama also added their own twist to the panorama's props, but instead of props to make the scenes more real, they incorporated sounds. Another similarity to the panorama was the effect the diorama had on its audience. Some patrons experienced a stupor, while others were alienated by the spectacle. The alienation of the diorama was caused by the connection the scene drew to art, nature and death. After Daguerre and Bouton's first exhibition in London, one reviewer noted a stillness like that "of the grave." To remedy this tomblike atmosphere Daguerre painted both sides of the canvas, known as "the double effect." By lighting both painted sides of the canvas, light was transmitted and reflected producing a type of transparency producing the effect of time passing. This effect gave the crew operating the lights and turning the roundabout a new type of control over the audience than the panorama ever had.

In Britain and particularly in the US, the panoramic ideal was intensified by unrolling a canvas-backed scroll past the viewer in a Moving Panorama, an alteration of an idea that was familiar in the hand-held landscape scrolls of Song dynasty. First unveiled in 1809 in Edinburgh, Scotland, the moving panorama required a large canvas and two vertical rollers to be set up on a stage. Peter Marshall added the twist to Barker's original creation, which saw success throughout the 19th and into the 20th century. The scene or variation of scenes passed between the rollers, eliminating the need to showcase and view the panorama in a rotunda. A precursor to "moving" pictures, the moving panorama incorporated music, sound effects and stand-alone cut-outs to create their mobile effect. Such a traveling motion allowed for new types of scenes, such as chase sequences, that could not be produced so well in either the diorama or the panorama. In contrast specifically to the diorama, where the audience seemed to be physically rotated, the moving panorama gave patrons a new perspective, allowing them to "[function] as a moving eye".

The origin of the panoramic concept

As a panorama was originally an equal geographical representation next map, relief and profile (which is now almost exclusively used as a geological profile) referred. It got a great influence on the land surveying, because both methods of height measurement, as the Landesaufnahme (the measuring table method) were developed from it. There were panorama representations in two basic forms:

As long picture strips, which put together at the ends either a 360 ° all-round view (cylindrical Rundrundpanorama) or a longer section of it reproduced or the view to a side of a route or a riverside, sometimes also a seashore.

Rarer is the top view of a terrain, as with a fisheye lens (wide angle 180 °) recorded, sometimes referred to as circular ring panorama. In the middle of the viewpoint and on the edge of the horizon line can be seen. For a closer look, the sheet is rotated around the center. This form was used almost exclusively for tourism or educational purposes.

The greatest importance for scientific purposes had panoramas from the late 18th century to the mid-19th century. The first scientific mountain panorama was drawn by Jacques-Barthélemy Micheli du Crest from Geneva in 1754. It was printed under the title Prospect géometrique des montagnes neigées dites glacier, telles qu'on les découvre en tems favorable depuis le château d 'arbourg dans les territoires des Grisons, you Canton of Ury and the Highlands of the Canton of Berne with Tobias Conrad Lotter in Augsburg 1755. But there were already many panoramic representations going back to the 15th and especially in the 16th century. However, these have not yet been created on an exact geometrical basis. Perhaps the topographer Anton van den Wyngaerde (1525-1571) from Amsterdam has already 1548/49 under the title Zelandia Descriptio made a cylindrical all-round panorama.

Also noteworthy are the long stripe-shaped coastal views produced on voyages of discovery, e.g. by William Westall (1781-1850) from the book of books on the travel book Matthew Flinders'. Panoramic views have become popular since the mid-19th century, especially as illustrations in guidebooks, e.g. Switzerland.

The panorama as art

Robert Barker's patented staging of the cylindrical large-format surfaces through railings reminiscent of viewing platforms and natural objects occupying the foreground made them into profitable and popular art entertainment since 1792. In the degree of her imitation of reality, she went beyond the simple wide-format but two-dimensional panoramic image.

The marketing of the patent in the metropolises by Barker and his imitators has led to exaggerated valuations: Stephan Oettermann defines the panorama in his monograph of the same name as: "machine in which the rule of the bourgeois view is learned and at the same time glorified, as an instrument of liberation and to reincarnate the gaze, as the first optical mass medium in the strict sense. " Albrecht Koschorke describes the panorama as a "skimmed picture", that is, as the forerunner of panoramic apperception, and Walter Benjamin speaks of "aquariums of the distant and past".

Illusion generation

The panorama of the 19th century often consisted of several walkable levels, from which the visitor could, for example, look from an elevated position to a 360 ° monumental image. The most common motifs were city or landscape views made using a camera obscura. Combination forms with a projection using the lantern magica were also common.

Generation or technology

A large circular building (rotunda) will be entered after paying the entrance fee through the entrance. Through the darkened corridor, in which the eyes get accustomed to the twilight inside, the visitor reaches the viewer's platform via a staircase. Above her, a shield-like sail stretches, which has the function of removing the upper edge of the surrounding framed frameless picture with a landscape view of 360 ° as well as the ring-shaped roof skylights in the roof of the view of the beholder. Daylight falls on the painting, is reflected from there and illuminates the room evenly. The lower edge of the circular painting is obscured by either the projecting platform itself or the faux terrain running between the platform and the screen, which conceal the transition from three-dimensional space into two-dimensional image with real, plastic objects.

While the viewer's gaze can glide freely over the surrounding 1,000 to 2,000 square meter screen, a barrier prevents the vertical viewing angle from exceeding its size. Nowhere can the gaze wander over the painting to compare the picture painted in "proto-photographic" realism with reality. In addition, since all the light seems to emanate from the painting itself, after a few minutes the visitor has the perfect and astonishing illusion that he has actually been "moved by magic" to the place shown.

Involvement of the viewer

By designing the visitor platform in a style that suits the theme of the picture (for example, as a balloon gondola or as a ship's deck), the visitor was given the feeling that he himself was at the scene.

Perspective

In the place of the central perspective, which was binding for the peep-box images, the Panorama created a "democratic" countless eye points and, with them, viewer perspectives implied a polyperspective.

The central perspective construction is based on a rigid eye and constructs the image towards it by gathering the lines of flight in the eye point. For viewing such a picture, this means that only one viewer at a time can look at the picture from the opposite standpoint. Images constructed in a central perspective are exclusive images insofar as they allow only one person for viewing.

In the panorama, on the other hand, all observer points of view coincide with the horizon; the circular form results in an infinite number of focal points of observation and thus (theoretically) an infinite number of observers who can look at the picture undistorted.

panorama size

The first panoramas were relatively small. This quickly caused the visitor to feel dizzy, as he felt he walked several miles with each step. The problem was resolved by increasing the image diameter from about 10 meters to about 30 meters in the 1830s.

Faux terrain

Initially, to conceal the lower edge of the painting, cloths were stretched between the platform and the canvas. In the 1820s, people began to make the foreground plastic, in line with the depiction. At the same time, the representation of the foremost image plane was transposed into a relief, and from then on it continued under the platform in a fully plastic manner, so that the physical and spatial values ​​of painting optically merged with the real ones. The decisive factor was that no clear distinction could be made between painted and real image objects.

Visitors

Goal of the panorama

It was supposed to get rid of obstacles in order to allow a cool, distanced view of things that is not obscured by any subjectivity, that is not restricted to the limits of the physical. A look as the objective sciences of the time claimed him. The viewer should be given the most immediate, comprehensive and deceptively genuine impression of specific locations or events. The visitor should be able to let his gaze wander as if he were in the open air and at the actual place of action.

The pleasure of seeing should be complemented educationally by its geographical, scientific or ethnological themes. The value of a panorama as an educational entity depended directly on the true-to-life drawing. For this purpose, the painters had to prove the authenticity of their image.

Purpose of the panoramas visit

The urbanization promoted the curiosity of the citizen on the places and events of the wide world. It was a journey through the eyes to unknown locations outside of one's own everyday life. It pretended to be "as if in a dream", more convenient and faster than any other means of travel. The interest was related to the onset of tourism. People who had actually seen the places could now expertly compare their memories with the picture, and people planning a trip could anticipate what they were expecting in advance and critically review those impressions.

image issues

In the Panorama, one moved away from mythological and allegorical representations, which were understandable only to the educated observer, to realistic landscape depictions. Away from the depiction of religious-historical events that illustrated the biblical story, to the presentation of actual real political events that interested the newspaper reader.

In a first phase of the panoramas, there were mainly landscape paintings of foreign and known places to admire. In a second phase, historical events took center stage. The picture selection was difficult. It should have happened not too long ago. At first, battle images of the recent past were up to date. Later, they showed older to ancient battles.

information brochures

Information brochures were orientation plans with an outline drawing that numbered interesting points and provided explanations. Over time, the souvenir programs developed from small brochures, then strong notebooks, last small books of 60 to 80 pages with explanatory text. Very rarely, however, are the panoramas themselves, the circumstances of their creation, their dimensions, etc. described in these brochures. The texts are limited to the detailed geographical description of the sitter, their history and peculiarities. So no explanation of the sitter, but only additional information.

Panorama as art

mass Art

Nobody ever asked who painted the picture or whether the pictures had been painted by anyone. The audience consisted mostly of less educated people, who had few other opportunities to see or judge the quality of original oil paintings. The panorama should simply be pleasing, amusing, surprising, astonishing, educating, entertaining, and finally making a profit for its owner. The illusion of the baffling reality was paramount; "High" art of a major artist would only have disturbed.

mass medium

The panorama was called the first mass medium in the strict sense. Unlike previous collections, it could be viewed by anyone. The images were understandable by their realism for everyone. The size of the image and the complicated manufacturing process required a division of labor production. The immense costs forbade a private purchase and thus elitist art enjoyment - the medium had to be financed by mass sale of tickets.

Artistic aspect

The choice of the observer's point of view was very important, because things could not simply be added or omitted (through artistic freedom) - after all, the panorama should be absolutely true to reality. This choice was the artist's only free choice, who otherwise had to reproduce everything only 1 to 1.

The precision and truthfulness went so far that before drawing extensive research work was done, yes to present everything correctly (for example, in historical events). But not only the tangible objects should be displayed accurately in a panorama, but also the exact time of the event presented. Exact study of the natural light conditions was inevitable.

Three high blossoms

In the 1830s, the public lost interest in the panorama as the need for visual information was more and more satisfied by the rapidly evolving photography and illustrated newspapers. It was not until the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 that the panorama blossomed. The battles offered new material and promoted patriotism. The financing form of the joint stock companies was found. The rotundas were standardized. Within a short period of time, new rotundas were built on behalf of stock corporations in almost every major city in Europe and America. Only at the beginning of the 20th century were panoramas replaced by newer forms of media and changed entertainment habits. From the 1970s on, first in the communist sphere of influence, a renaissance of the panoramic phenomenon began. Since then, panoramas have been created almost every year worldwide.

distribution

Single funding

In Barker's time, it was still the artists themselves who were responsible for opening hours, advertising and tickets in addition to producing the panorama. That's why the entire family was often involved in the company in the beginning to make the enormous amount of work and keep it cost-effective. Most of the panoramas had to be exhibited in larger halls, since the high investment costs of a rotunda building could only be applied by a few artists.

companies

The stock companies of the second panoramas phase were able to raise the necessary immense capital easily. They wooed investors with significant earnings promises, which, however, could only rarely be met. Most of them went bankrupt sooner or later.

standardization

The joint-stock companies provided for an international exploitation of the images by having standardized rotundas built in which the scrolls could circulate. In practice, however, there was the problem that there was hardly a pictorial theme that was on the one hand "neutral" enough not to offend the national feeling in any of the potential exhibiting countries, but on the other so interesting that it attracted enough publicity everywhere.

Teamwork

In the second panoramic phase, the panoramas had to be produced within months. A hint of artistic individuality; young painters, who were not very ambitious, were hired. The individual panoramen painters then specialized in architecture, landscape or decorative paintings. The bringing together of the individual specialists was the responsibility of the responsible painter. The painters were a whole range of craftsmen and assistants at hand, the colors mixed, scaffolding pushed etc ...

Similarities between panorama, photography and film

The panorama was to a certain extent the forerunner of early cinema, insofar as it enabled the immediate participation in unknown places and historical events. As the panoramas wanted to depict the depicted nature in a deceptively real way, they point to photography, and the moving panorama variants to the film. The organizational and financing structures were the same as those of the cinema.

Romantic criticism of panoramas

The panorama's rise in popularity was a result of its accessibility in that people did not need a certain level of education to enjoy the views it offered. Accordingly, patrons from across the social scale flocked to rotundas throughout Europe.

While easy access was an attraction of the panorama, some people believed it was nothing more than a parlor trick bent on deceiving its public audience. Designed to have a lingering effect upon the viewer, the panorama was placed in the same category as propaganda of the period, which was also seen as deceitful. The locality paradox also attributed to the arguments of panorama critics. A phenomenon resulting from immersion in a panorama, the locality paradox happened when people were unable to distinguish where they were: in the rotunda or at the scene they were seeing.

Writers feared the panorama for the simplicity of its illusion. Hester Piozzi was among those who rebelled against the growing popularity of the panorama for precisely this reason. She did not like seeing so many people – elite and otherwise – fooled by something so simple.

Another problem with the panorama was what it came to be associated with, namely, by redefining the sublime to incorporate the material. In their earliest forms, panoramas depicted topographical scenes and in so doing, made the sublime accessible to every person with 3 shillings in his or her pocket. The sublime became an everyday thing and therefore, a material commodity. By associating the sublime with the material, the panorama was seen as a threat to romanticism, which was obsessed with the sublime. According to the romantics, the sublime was never supposed to include materiality and by linking the two, panoramas tainted the sublime.

The poet William Wordsworth has long been characterized as an opponent of the panorama, most notably for his allusion to it in Book Seven of The Prelude. It has been argued that Wordsworth's problem with the panorama was the deceit it used to gain popularity. He felt, critics say, that the panorama not only exhibited an immense scene of some kind, but also the weakness of human intelligence. Wordsworth was offended by the fact that so many people found panoramas irresistible and concluded that people were not smart enough to see through the charade. Because of his argument in "The Prelude," it is safe to assume Wordsworth saw a panorama at some point during his life, but it is unknown which one he saw; there is no substantial proof he ever went, other than his description in the poem.

However, Wordsworth's hatred of the panorama was not limited to its deceit. The panorama's association with the sublime was likewise offensive to the poet as were other spectacles of the period that competed with reality. As a poet, Wordsworth sought to separate his craft from the phantasmagoria enveloping the population. In this context, phantasmagoria refers to signs and other circulated propaganda, including billboards, illustrated newspapers and panoramas themselves. Wordsworth's biggest problem with panoramas was their pretense: the panorama lulled spectators into stupors, inhibiting their ability to imagine things for themselves. Wordsworth wanted people to see the representation depicted in the panorama and appreciate it for what it was – art.

Conversely, some critics argue Wordsworth was not opposed to the panorama, but was rather hesitant about it. A main argument is that other episodes in The Prelude have just as much sensory depth as panoramas had. Such depth could only be accomplished through imitation of the human senses, something both the panorama and The Prelude succeed at. Therefore, since both the panorama and The Prelude imitate the senses, they are equal and suggest Wordsworth was not entirely opposed to panoramas.

A modern take on the panorama believes the enormous paintings filled a hole in the lives of those who lived during the nineteenth century. Bernard Comment said in his book The Painted Panorama, that the masses needed "absolute dominance" and the illusion offered by the panorama gave them a sense of organization and control. Despite the power it wielded, the panorama detached audiences from the scene they viewed, replacing reality and encouraging them to watch the world rather than experience it.

Surviving panoramas

Relatively few of these unwieldy ephemera survive. The oldest known surviving panorama (completed in 1814 by Marquard Wocher) is on display at Schadau Castle, depicting an average morning in the Swiss town of Thun. As of today it is owned by the Gottfried Keller Foundation. Another rare surviving great-circle panorama is the Panorama Mesdag, completed in 1881 and housed in a purpose-built museum in The Hague, showing the dunes of nearby Scheveningen. Both of these works are considered of interest as they depict domestic scenes of their times. Depictions of warfare were more common as subject matter, an example of which is located at the battlefield of Waterloo, depicting the battle.

An exhibition "Panoramania" was held at the Barbican in the 1980s, with a catalog by Ralph Hyde. The Racławice Panorama, currently located in Wrocław, Poland, is a monumental (15 × 120 metre) panoramic painting depicting the Battle of Racławice, during the Kościuszko Uprising. A panorama of the Battle of Stalingrad is on display at Mamayev Kurgan. Among Franz Roubaud's great panoramas, those depicting the Siege of Sevastopol (1905) and Battle of Borodino (1911) survive, although the former was damaged during the Siege of Sevastopol (1942) and the latter was transferred to Poklonnaya Gora. The Pleven Panorama in Pleven, Bulgaria, depicts the events of the Siege of Plevna in 1877 on a 115×15-metre canvas with a 12-meter foreground.

Five large panoramas survive in North America: the Cyclorama of Jerusalem (a.k.a. the Panorama of Jerusalem at the Moment of Christ's Death) at St. Anne, outside of Quebec City; the Gettysburg Cyclorama depicting Pickett's Charge during the Battle of Gettysburg in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania; John Vanderlyn's Panorama of the Garden and Palace of Versailles at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City] and the Atlanta Cyclorama, which depicts the Battle of Atlanta, in Atlanta, Georgia. A fifth panorama, also depicting the Battle of Gettysburg, was willed in 1996 to Wake Forest University in North Carolina; it is in poor condition and not on public display. It was purchased in 2007 by a group of North Carolina investors who hope to resell it to someone willing to restore it. Only pieces survive of a massive cyclorama depicting the Battle of Shiloh.

In the area of the moving panorama, there are somewhat more extant, though many are in poor repair and the conservation of such enormous paintings poses very expensive problems. The most notable rediscovered panorama in the United States was the Great Moving Panorama of Pilgrim's Progress, which was found in storage at the York Institute now the Saco Museum in Saco, Maine, by its former curator Tom Hardiman. It was found to incorporate designs by many of the leading painters of its day, including Jasper Francis Cropsey, Frederic Edwin Church, and Henry Courtney Selous (Selous was the in-house painter for the original Barker panorama in London for many years.)

The St. Louis Art Museum owns another moving panorama, which it is conserving in public during the summers of 2011 and 2012. "The Panorama of the Monumental Grandeur of the Mississippi Valley" — the only remaining of six known Mississippi River panorama paintings—measures 2.3 metres (90 inches) wide by 106 metres (348 feet) long and was commissioned c. 1850 by an eccentric amateur archaeologist named Montroville W. Dickeson. Judith H. Dobrzynski wrote about the restoration in an article in the Wall Street Journal dated June 27, 2012.

In 1918, the New Bedford Whaling Museum acquired the Grand Panorama of a Whaling Voyage Round the World, created by artists Benjamin Russell and Caleb Purrington in 1848. At about 395 m (1,295 ft) long and 2.6 m (8 1⁄2 ft) high, it is one of the largest surviving moving panoramas (although far short of the "Three Miles [4800 m] of Canvass" advertised by its creators in their handbills). The Museum is currently planning for the conservation of the Grand Panorama. Although in storage, highlights may be seen on the Museum's Flickr pages

Another moving panorama was donated to the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection at Brown University Library in 2005. Painted in Nottingham, England around 1860 by John James Story (d. 1900), it depicts the life and career of the great Italian patriot, Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807–1882). The panorama stands about 1.4 m (4 1⁄2 ft) high and 83 m (273 ft) long, painted on both sides in watercolor. Numerous battles and other dramatic events in his life are depicted in 42 scenes, and the original narration written in ink survives.

The Arrival of the Hungarians, a vast cyclorama by Árpád Feszty et al., completed in 1894, is displayed at the Ópusztaszer National Heritage Park in Hungary. It was made to commemorate the 1000th anniversary of the 895 conquest of the Carpathian Basin by the Hungarians.

The Cyclorama of Early Melbourne, by artist John Hennings in 1892, still survives albeit having suffered water damage during a fire. Painted from a panoramic sketch of Early Melbourne in 1842 by Samuel Jackson. It places the viewer on top of the partially constructed Scott's Church on Collins Street in the Melbourne CBD. Commissioned to celebrate 50 years of the city of Melbourne, it was displayed in the Melbourne Exhibition Building for nearly 30 years before being taken into storage. Relatively small for a Cyclorama, it measured 36 m (118 ft) long and 4 m (13 ft) high.

The Biological museum (Stockholm), founded by hunter and taxidermist Gustaf Kolthoff, opened its dioramas to the public in November 1893 and is still an active museum with about 15000 visitors yearly. The museum has panorama paintings by Bruno Liljefors (assisted by Gustaf Fjæstad), Kjell Kolthoff and several hundred preserved animals in their natural habitats.

Cau Ferrat Museum, Sitges, Spain

Cau Ferrat, located in Sitges (in Catalonia in Spain), was the home and study of artist and writer Santiago Rusiñol, one of the most important figures of the Modernisme movement in Catalonia. It is one of the three museums in Sitges located on the shores of Sant Sebastià beach.

The Cau Ferrat Museum was founded in 1893 by the artist Santiago Rusiñol (1861-1931) as a home workshop and became public museum in 1933, preserving the artistic spirit inspired by his founder. The Museum contains collections of ancient art gathered by the artist (painting, forge, ceramics, glass, archeology, sculpture and furniture) and modern art (painting, drawing, sculpture) with works by Rusiñol, Casas, Picasso R. Pichot, Mas i Fondevila, Zuloaga, Regoyos and Degouwe of Nucques, Henry Clarasó Manolo Hugué and Pau Gargallo, among others. The activities organized by Rusiñol with the participation of artists, musicians and writers transformed Cau Ferrat in the Temple of "Modernisme"...

Painting, drawing, sculpture, wrought iron, ceramic, glass and much of the plastic art authored by Rusiñol itself form a unique artistic ensemble that, alongside with the building hosting the works, are an example of how "Modernisme" revered all art forms. It is the first must-see visit among all the museums of Sitges.

The renovation of the building carried out between 2010 and 2014 led to the refurbishment of the structure and the restoration and recovery of all the original assets that were part of our heritage.

History:

The history of the museums of Sitges is closely linked to collecting art since its inception and well as before the opening of its first public museum, the Museum of Cau Ferrat (1933). Both the art collection that the painter and writer Santiago Rusiñol started very young, being a disciple of the painter Tomàs Moragas, in which initially forged predominates wrought iron and antiques, as the collection from the American industrialist, philanthropist and collector Charles Deering assembled by Miquel Utrillo in parallel with the construction of Maricel Palace (1910-1921) are the result of determination and perseverance in order to configure collections to enjoy and admire.

What had been the home workshop of Santiago Rusiñol during the nineties of the nineteenth century and the museum-workshop, is finally bequeathed to Sitges due to the love he professed for this population, as we read literally in his will at the artist's death (1931). In 1933, the museum became public thanks to the director of the Museum of Art of Catalonia, Joaquim Folch i Torres. From that date, the Cau Ferrat Museum is the dean of all museums of Sitges.

With the collection of Charles Deering it is just the opposite. In 1921, due to disagreements with Miquel Utrillo, he takes his art collections out of Maricel. The halls of his homes and the Palace became empty, showing empty walls, ceilings and roofs in an artistic and sumptuous complex artistic with a high artistic and architectural value, one of the most illustrious exponents of "Noucentista" architecture, as had been recognized from early construction.

In 1932, Joaquin Folch i Torres rents Maricel Palace to the descendants of Deering, with the idea of expanding the art collections of Cau Ferrat, the true center of all the museums in Sitges. In 1933 he installs the collection of wrought iron belonging to the Museum Board, in addition to the large wrought iron collection of Santiago Rusiñol located in Cau Ferrat. The Board also provides a large part of the works of the Museu de Reproductions ( Museum of Reproductions).

The Maricel Palace accommodates the Art Collection of the City of Sitges, that was started in 1911 with the acquisition of a picture by Joaquim Sunyer, "Maternidad" (oil, 1908), acquired by popular subscription following the exhibition of the artist at Galeries Laietanes of Barcelona that year. To this and other works that are property of Sitges, other deposits are added made by the Board of Museums with the will to outline and complete a discourse of painting from Sitges with a high quality and significance. These works as Processo de Sant Bartomeu, de Felip Masó; La recolecció de la malvasia, from Joaquim de Miró, or En Malavida i En Tirano from Santiago Rusiñol.

In 1936 the Maritime Collection of Emergencies Rig i Ravenous is installed, donated to Sitges by his brother, Joseph, so it could be managed by the Board of Cau Ferrat. And yet, in June of that same year, it takes place the exhibition of paintings by El Greco that are public property in Catalonia. Thus, thanks to Joaquim Folch i Torres, the Maricel Palau Maricel becomes in the museum that shelter new art collections until 1970 when it closes doors.

The front building that had been the winter residence of Deering, adjacent to the official residence and that was the dividing house between Maricel and Cau Ferrat, known as Can Xicarrons, with the departure of Deering serves for another use. The American donates the property to painter Ramon Casas, with whom he shares a great friendship. The residence of Deering at Maricel located between the Fonollar street and the waterfront remained as the property of Deering heirs until 1969.

With the change of regime, the Cau Ferrat Museum and the Board of Cau Ferrat chartered in 1933 during the Republic to manage the Museum and its extension to Maricel remained strongly conditioned and limited by the Franco regime: the abolition of self-government institutions, the screening and expulsion of Joaquim Folch i Torres from the direction of the Art Museum of Catalonia, the transfer of all that had been governed the Catalan Government in the Provincial Government of Barcelona, and the political vicissitudes of the Provincial Government of Barcelona and City Hall of Sitges .The Board of Cau Ferrat remains in force for a few years but with zero possibilities of returning to the creative impetus of the thirties. The Museum Board remains limited to the City Hall of Barcelona. The governance and the finance affairs of the Cau Ferrat Museum and the Maricel Palace enter into a growing crisis that leads them to economic and technical decadence.

On 21 January 1966, an agreement was signed between the City Hall of Sitges and Barcelona Provincial Council to solve the situation in favor of the Barcelona Provincial Council. The Cau Ferrat is closed in 1966 for a year for maintenance works. In 1968, the Council takes charge of the full management of Cau Ferrat and Maricel Palace, burying definitely the Board of Cau Ferrat.

In 1949 a new museum is inaugurated in Sitges, Romantic Museum Can Llopis. The last descendant of the family, married the diplomat Manuel Llopis de Casades (1885-1935) bequeathed the manor to the Government of Catalonia. The vicissitudes of the war and postwar delayed the receipt of inheritance, heirs offered the property again in 1943 to the Province of Barcelona. Six years later, the museum during the first phase and gradually opens the entire building to the public. In 1961, the collection of dolls of painter and illustrator Lola Anglada moves to the second floor.

The situation of the entire Maricel complex is more complex. In 1952, the city of Sitges purchased Maricel Palace to the heirs of Charles Deering, that becomes a property of the City Hall in its entirely. Ramon Casas died without direct descendents (1934) and the house that Deering donated to him goes to his relatives named Rocamora, until the Provincial Government buys the property (1973). The waterfront building that had been the residence of Deering was still closed and unused until 1969, when the Province of Barcelona buys the property to install the collection of Dr. Jesus Pérez-Rosales

With the opening of the new museum called Maricel de Mar, the collections and halls of Maricel Palace are definitely, remaining neglected in and poor conditions of preservation until 1995.

The arrival of the Collection of Dr. Jesús Pérez Rosales and his installation at the Maricel Museum is part of the history of the cultural policy during late Francoism its effects on the museistic structure of the Provincial Government of Barcelona and the museums in Sitges. It is the other side of the coin of the intervention process of the Board of Museums of Catalonia regarding the expansion of Cau Ferrat and the installation of the Museum of Reproductions,

Between 1975 and 1995, there are several attempts by the civilian society to promote an agreement of the Barcelona Provincial Council and the City Hall of Sitges, all unsuccessful, to reconstitute the Board of Cau Ferrat or, at least, and the reopening and dignification of closed artistic collections, and to further the modernization and growth of the Museums of Sitges. The Museums do not have any other staff than the concierge staff that is in charge of customer service, and the figure of a curator or director belonging to the organic structure of the Barcelona Provincial Council.. The meritorious task carried out by curator Assumpta Gou i Vernet in the late seventies for the constitution of Sitges Heritage Association is neglected by political and administrative authorities of the time. The Maricel Palau becomes a facility congresses and conferences for various activities assigned by the Sitges Town Council since 1979. The Museu Cau Ferrat Museum Maricel de Mar and Can Rocamora and Palau Maricel, lack any regular maintenance tasks on all the problems suffered, including structural, preventive conservation and adaptation to technical regulations and also the facilities were structurally deteriorated to levels that threaten its sustainability, conservation of works of art and character of museums open to the public.

In 1994 began the last stage of the museums in Sitges with the constitution of the Sitges Heritage Association, the governing body and management of museums Sitges. The Sitges Heritage Association is chartered by the Council of the City of Barcelona and the City Hall of Sitges, each of which contributes to fifty percent of heritage buildings and art collections. By the Barcelona Provincial Council, Maricel Museum, the Collection of Dr. Jesús Pérez Rosales and the Romantic Museum, the collection of dolls Lola Anglada; by the Sitges Town Hall, the Museum of Cau Ferrat and the Palau Maricel with the respective contents more Maritime Collection of Emerencià Roig Raventós.

In 1995, the Sitges Art Collection and the Maritime Collection were installed on the second floor of the Museum Maricel while the Wrought Iron Collection from the Board of Museums remained in the facilities of Maricel Palace, lacking any museum project.

The restoration project, fitting and refurbishment of all the buildings of Maricel de Mar Museum, Can Rocamora and Cau Ferrat Museum in Sitges executed by the Sitges Heritage Association in 2009, aims to general sanitation and structural consolidation of buildings, compliance with standards of facilities, security and access and restoration of artistic elements inside and outside buildings. The project is funded by the Ministry of Public Works under the 1% Cultural Program, the Provincial Council of Barcelona and the Generalist of Catalonia. Started in 2010, the project ended in 2014. Simultaneously, the new museum project has been prepared in parallel of aforesaid buildings and its implementation has ended, entirely funded by the Barcelona Provincial Council.

The collection of paintings and drawings

The Cau Ferrat's collection of paintings and drawings, along with ironwork, is the largest in terms of the number of items.[citation needed] It contains those works by Rusiñol that the artist chose to hold onto all his life and for which he felt a special affection. Furthermore, many of the leading artists of Catalan of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are represented: Ramon Casas, Pablo Picasso, Arcadi Mas i Fondevila, Isidre Nonell, Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa, Ramon Pichot, etc. Some were friends of Rusiñol. The paintings and drawings in the Cau reflect its owner’s tastes as well as the artistic trends in vogue at that time: impressionism, modernism, symbolism, etc.

Most of the works are by the artist himself. The tour of the collection follows the order of the rooms: Entrance Hall, Kitchen/Dining-Room, Sala del Brollador (Fountain room), Office, Living-Room and Recess, Staircase and Great Hall.

The collection of ironwork

Rusiñol’s reputation as a collector of ironwork preceded his fame as a painter and his popularity as a dramatist. Thanks to Rusiñol and a small group of antique ironwork collectors (amongst them several of friends of his who shared his obsession), the art of wrought iron was no longer seen as the expression of a lesser creative activity and became a subject for study. At the same time, it underwent an important revaluation which, like in many other arts and crafts, showed itself especially in Modernista architecture (e.g. the buildings designed by Gaudí, Puig i Cadafalch or Domènech i Montaner).

The collection of glassware

Unlike the collection of ironwork, part of which already decorated the walls of the studio-workshop in Barcelona that Santiago Rusiñol shared with Enric Clarasó, the collection of glass arrived in Sitges after the Cau Ferrat was built. In fact, it doesn’t make up a uniform whole so much as two large collections with a total of almost 400 items acquired by Rusiñol at two different moments in his life. In the Great Hall is found the collection of glass from modern times, while the Sala del Brollador is the setting for the archaeological or antique glass.The different origin of the items and the wide time-scale they cover mean that a lot of the different techniques used in working this material in the course of history are present.

The collection of furniture and sculpture

On entering the Cau Ferrat for the first time, the visitor sees the large number of items the museum houses and the horror vacui that presides over the whole building, for which reason many items are only glanced at or even go unnoticed. Amongst the items that are most often missed are the furniture and sculptures, which are often considered simple decorative complements of no intrinsic value.

The collection of ceramics

In the course of his life, Santiago Rusiñol put together a considerable collection of ceramics which today is concentrated mainly in two of the rooms on the ground floor of the Cau Ferrat, the Kitchen/Dining-room and the Sala del Brollador. Here the visitor will find a varied selection of more than 200 items ranging from the fourteenth century to the nineteenth century, mainly plates and dishes, but also bowls, pharmaceutical jars, washbasins, fruit-stands, pitchers, soup tureens and various tiled panels.

These items come from very varied origins. Catalan potteries account for about a quarter of the collection, although the main pottery-making centres of Valencia, Aragon, Castile, Andalusia and Murcia are also represented. The collection is completed with a few items from Majorca,Italy and Florence.

Paleoart

Paleoart (also spelled palaeoart, paleo-art, or paleo art) is any original artistic work that attempts to reconstruct or depict prehistoric life according to the current knowledge and scientific evidence at the moment of creating the artwork. The term paleoart was introduced in the late 1980s by Mark Hallett for art that depicts subjects related to paleontology. These may be representations of fossil remains or depictions of the living creatures and their ecosystems. The term is a portmanteau of “art” and the ancient Greek word for old.

History

As early as the 16th century, there are engravings of fossil remains in natural history books. At the end of the 18th century Georges Cuvier, one of the founders of paleontology, was the first to reconstruct fossil vertebrates from bone, and to have them published in engraving. But this remains in the context of the description of bone and not in the reconstruction of animals extinct in flesh and bone10. One of the forerunners of reconstructing faunas from past periods, can be found after Stephen Jay Gould in the Physica sacra published by Johann Jakob Scheuchzer, and illustrated with 745 intaglio prints, illustrating biblical history according to an approach scientific sense, in the sense it was given at the time11. One of the most notable boards is engraving 49, which represents the homo diluvi testis (witness to the Flood), which Cuvier revealed a century later that it was actually a fossil salamander.

Between Scheuchzer, and the early nineteenth century, the date of the first fossil reconstructions, the works of geology and paleontology are content to reproduce planks of fossils, and almost none offers reconstructed scene periods of history of the earth at a time when the notion of extinct species and geological times is not yet fully accepted.

Duria Antiquior, an older Dorset, marks an important date in the artistic reconstruction of a period of prehistory. This watercolor by Henry De la Beche, dated 1830 and several times reproduced, becomes in the nineteenth century, the canonical model of scenes showing extinct species in their environment. It was the first pictorial reconstruction of a scene dating back to the dawn of time, based on fossil finds found by Mary Anning. De la Beche establishes the codes of the reconstruction of prehistoric scenes, which will be taken up after him by many paleoartists, by the profusion of represented species, and in situations of predation. In the foreground, the jaw of the ichthyosaur closing on the long neck of the plesiosaur, becomes a cliché of paleontological iconography.

Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins is the most important paleoartist of this period, his collaboration with paleontologist Richard Owen, is the first example of a joint work between an artist and a scientist to restore the appearance of missing animals, an example that will continue later. with the collaborations of Charles R. Knight and Henry Fairfield Osborn in the early twentieth century, or Zdenek Burian and Josef Augusta. The highlight of this cooperation is the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs, the first life-size sculptures of dinosaurs as their appearance at the time. Some models were originally created for the 1851 World's Fair, but 33 of them were finally made when Crystal Palace was moved to Sydenham in South London. Owen organized a famous dinner for 21 guests all of prominent scientists inside the hollow concrete of Iguanodon on New Year's Eve in 1853.

Modern Paleoarte

The true leap in quality of paleoarte occurred at the end of the nineteenth century, thanks to the American artist Charles R. Knight. Knight used comparative anatomy to represent fossil animals, aiming to reconstruct the soft tissues and, finally, the outer appearance of the dinosaurs. He followed, for his work, a technique that added layers on layers, starting from the bone structure, succeeding in correctly representing posture and appearance of the animal . His representations quickly surpassed all previous Victorian era realism, thanks to his close collaboration with paleontologist Henry Fairfield Osborn .

Throughout the 20th century, many other artists ventured into the representation of extinct species, including Zdeněk Burian, Jay Matternes and Rudolph Zallinger; the latter won the Pulitzer Prize for painting in 1949. Thanks to the collaboration with paleontologists and palaeobotanists, the reconstruction of the appearance of prehistoric animals has become a representation of the scientific knowledge of the moment. The depicted appearance of animals has therefore changed over time, changing with the progress of scientific discoveries .

Towards the end of the twentieth century, there was a fashionable return to the dinosaurs. In 1986, the paleontologist Robert Bakker published Dinosaurs Heresies, a book in which he revolutionized the anatomical and metabolic conception of dinosaurs. It suggests their nature of warm-blooded animals and the active way of life, radically changing the established idea of ​​cold-blooded and indolent dinosaurs. Bakker also makes the combination of the dinosaurs, as possible ancestors of modern birds.

In this period of rebirth of interest for prehistory, reconstructions of extinct animals have multiplied where the artists have paid a more attentive ear to new scientific discoveries . If on the one hand we have seen creations as faithful as possible to what was hypothesised by science, a vein of sensationalistic paleoart has also appeared, where animals often appear to be aggressive and produce vocalizations and improbable roars . Many authors have also uncritically jumped on some discoveries, such as the existence of feathered dinosaurs in the Mesozoic , while others have voluntarily left out for reasons dictated by the need to impress the public  . Once again, even these modern representations arise from a misinterpretation of fossil discoveries: the use of plumage would be born as a protection against attacks   rather than a form of locomotion or to maintain body temperature. There remains therefore a certain resistance to the new iconography on the dinosaurs, whose realism contrasts with the fantasy reconstructions to which both the scientific environment and the public are accustomed.

The paleoarte is still subject to artistic speculations, given that not everything rebuilds paleontology. In the early years of 2010, a group of artists gave birth to some experimental publications  , depicting dinosaurs according to the most recent theories. This strand aims to revive the public's interest in science, rather than for the spectacularity of the drawings, and at the same time push the frontier between scientific work and artistic representation of nature further.

Production

The work of paleoartists is not mere fantasy of an artist's imagination but rather consists of cooperative discussions among experts and artists. When attempting to reconstruct an extinct animal, the artist must utilise an almost equal mixture of artistry and scientific knowledge. The artist James Gurney, known for the Dinotopia series of fiction books, has described the interaction between scientists and artists as the artist being the eyes of the scientist, since his illustrations bring shape to the theories; palaeoart determines how the public perceives long extinct animals.

Scientific impact

Extinct marine animals were some of the first to be restored as in life. Art has been important in disseminating knowledge of dinosaurs since the term was introduced by Sir Richard Owen in 1842. With Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, Owen helped create the first life-size sculptures depicting dinosaurs as he thought they may have appeared. Some models were initially created for the Great Exhibition of 1851, but 33 were eventually produced when the Crystal Palace was relocated to Sydenham, in South London. Owen famously hosted a dinner for 21 prominent men of science inside the hollow concrete Iguanodon on New Year's Eve 1853. However, in 1849, a few years before his death in 1852, Gideon Mantell had realised that Iguanodon, of which he was the discoverer, was not a heavy, pachyderm-like animal, as Owen was putting forward, but had slender forelimbs; his death left him unable to participate in the creation of the Crystal Palace dinosaur sculptures, and so Owen's vision of dinosaurs became that seen by the public. He had nearly two dozen lifesize sculptures of various prehistoric animals built out of concrete sculpted over a steel and brick framework; two Iguanodon, one standing and one resting on its belly, were included. The dinosaurs remain in place in the park, but their depictions are now outdated in many respects.

A 2013 study found that older paleoart was still influential in popular culture long after new discoveries made them obsolete. This was explained as cultural inertia. In a 2014 paper, Mark P. Witton, Darren Naish, and John Conway outlined the historical significance of paleoart, and lamented its current state.

Recognition

Since 1999, the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology has awarded the John J. Lanzendorf PaleoArt Prize for achievement in the field. The society says that paleoart "is one of the most important vehicles for communicating discoveries and data among paleontologists, and is critical to promulgating vertebrate paleontology across disciplines and to lay audiences". The SVP is also the site of the occasional/annual "PaleoArt Poster Exhibit", a juried poster show at the opening reception of the annual SVP meetings.

The Museu da Lourinhã organizes the annual International Dinosaur Illustration Contest for promoting the art of dinosaur and other fossils.

Criticism

The excess production of images of dinosaurs, which on many occasions are not scientifically accurate reconstructions of the animal that would intend to show rebuilt or not supported by fossil evidence, has been called "paleoartism" by the paleontologist Andrea Cau; the problem posed by incorrect reconstructions increases when the demand from museums and scientific organizations of animal representations of the past is addressed to artists who are not able to perform correct reconstructions .

Cau states that it is "of the idea that 90% of paleo-art seen in these times is ugly, inaccurate, sad and annoying", with unnatural reconstructions in which the dinosaurs have their mouths wide open, roar, droop or stare , badly designed with feathers "probably induced by the obsession of" covering their animals with feathers "and above all" Everyone stares at making the most stunning heads, the most exuberant postures, and then they fall ruinously when it comes to representing all this that is distally to the elbow ".

Following this high production and diffusion of often imaginative reconstructive images, paleontologists have begun a revision of some interpretations made by paleoartists, including some whose works have also been used to illustrate scientific and popular texts on dinosaurs, and this happens in particular for those paleoartists qualified as independent researchers and not associated with any academic institution without a qualification in earth sciences or in biology .