The Great Art Of Light And Shadow
Archaeology of the Cinema

Widely regarded by historians of the early moving picture as the best work yet published on pre-cinema, The Great Art of Light and Shadow: Archaeology of the Cinema throws light on a fascinating range of optical media from the twelfth century to the turn of the twentieth. First published in French in 1994 and now translated into English, Laurent Mannoni's account projects a broad picture of the subject area now known as 'pre-cinema'.

Starting from the earliest uses of the camera obscura in astronomy and entertainment, Mannoni discusses, among many other devices, the invention and early years of the magic lantern in the seventeenth century, the peepshows and perspective views of the eighteenth century, and the many weird and wonderful nineteenth-century attempts to recreate visions of real life in different ways and forms. This fully-illustrated and accessible account of a strange mixture of science, magic, art and deception introduces to an English-speaking readership many aspects of pre-cinema history from other European countries

Contents: Part 1 The dreams of the eye: dark rooms and magic mirrors; light in the darkness; the "Lantern of Fear" tours the world. Part 2 Triumphant illusions: magie lumineuse in the country and the city; "Life and Motion" The 18th-century lantern slide; the phantasmagoria; from panorama to daguerreotype. Part 3 2The pencil of nature": the pirouette of the dancer; the "vital question" resolved?; great expectations; the magic lantern - a sovereign and her subjects. Part 4 Inscribing movement: the passage of Venus and the galloping horse; Marey releases the dove; the big wheel of little mirrors; Edison and his "films through the keyhole"; the labourers of the eleventh hour. Appendices: Museums displaying interesting items relating to the history of "pre-cinema" media; report of the scientists Jamin and Richer on the phantasmagorie of Robertson and the Phantasmaparastasie of Clisorius (17 July - 2 August 1800).

Laurent Mannoni is Curator of the equipment collection of the Cinémathèque Française. Richard Crangle is a freelance researcher and writer and formerly Assistant Director, Bill Douglas Centre for the History of Cinema and Popular Culture, University of Exeter.