A raree show, peep show or peep box is an exhibition of pictures or objects (or a combination of both), viewed through a small hole or magnifying glass. In 17th and 18th century Europe, it was a popular form of entertainment provided by wandering showmen.
Peep shows, [1] also known as peep box or raree show ("rarity show") can be traced back to the early modern period (15th century in Europe) and are known in various cultures.
According to a 15th century Italian manuscript biography, later published by 18th century historian Ludovico Antonio Muratori (1672 – 1750), the Italian humanist author, artist Leon Battista Alberti (1404 – 1472) created wonderful painted pictures exhibited inside a box with a small aperture. He had two kinds: night scenes with the moon and stars, and day scenes. It is thought these pictures may have been transparent and lit alternately from the front and from behind, with parts painted on the back causing changes in the scene. However, it has also been suggested that Alberti's box was an early image projector; a predecessor of the magic lantern. [2] [3]
In the 17th and 18th century peep shows were exhibited on streets and fairs across Europe by itinerant showmen, competing with other entertainment like dancing bears, jugglers, conjurers, et cetera. [4] Their wooden cabinets could have several viewing holes and contain sets of pictures to be set into a viewing position by pulling a corresponding string. The show was accompanied by spoken recitation that explained or dramatized what was happening inside. The boxes were often decorated inside to resemble theatrical scenes.[ citation needed ]
Peep shows were most popular in the 17th century in Holland. [5] Some artists from the 17th-century Dutch Golden Age painting, like Pieter Janssens Elinga and Samuel Dirksz van Hoogstraten created a type of peep shows with an illusion of depth perception by manipulating the perspective of the view seen inside, usually the interior of a room. From around 1700 many of these "perspective boxes" or "optica" had a bi-convex lens with a large diameter and small dioptre for an exaggerated perspective, giving a stronger illusion of depth. Most pictures showed architectural and topographical subjects with linear perspectives. [6] [7] From around 1745 similar perspective view prints became very popular for the zograscope, which used the same principle with the lens on a stand rather than in a box. Peep shows were further developed with translucent painting techniques, perforations and cut-out shapes that provided special effects when lit from behind by candles. Changing the light from the front to the back of the picture could change the scene from day to night, much like the dissolving views that would later become a popular type of magic lantern show. [6]
In the early 18th century perspective boxes(called megane in japanese(眼鏡) and inspired the art of Megane-e) were very appreciated in Japan, where they were referred to as Holland machines (和蘭眼鏡,Oranda megane,more accurately holland glasses). [4] The Dutch brought the first such device to Japan in the 1640s as a gift to the shōgun , but the devices became popular only after the Chinese popularized them [8] about 1758, [9] after which they began to influence Japanese artists. [8] [10]
19th-century Chinese peep shows were known by many names including la yang p'ien (Chinese :拉洋片; pinyin :lā yáng piān; lit. 'pulling foreign picture cards'). Sometimes the showman would perform for a crowd with puppets or pictures outside the box and then charge people extra to look through the holes. In Ottoman Syria a form of peep show called sanduk al-ajayib (صندوق العجائب, "wonder box") existed, which the storyteller carried on his back. The box had six holes through which people could see scenes backlit by a central candle. Sanduk al-ajayib stories were about contemporary figures and events, or showed scenes of heaven and hell. [11]
Other common subjects in peep shows throughout the world have been exotic views and animals, scenes of classical drama or masques, court ceremonies, surprise transformations (e.g., of an angel into a devil) and of course, lewd pictures.[ citation needed ]
Raree shows were precursors of toy theatres, with movable scenes and paper figurines, popular in the 19th century. They can also be seen as predecessors to optical toys like Chinese fireworks, the diorama, the stereoscope and the magic lantern. [3]
Some peep shows offer the only accurate representation of the stage design and scenery of the masques and pageants of their time. [3]
The magic lantern, also known by its Latin name laterna magica, is an early type of image projector that used pictures—paintings, prints, or photographs—on transparent plates, one or more lenses, and a light source. Because a single lens inverts an image projected through it, slides were inserted upside down in the magic lantern, rendering the projected image correctly oriented.
A camera obscura is a darkened room with a small hole or lens at one side through which an image is projected onto a wall or table opposite the hole.
A stereopticon is a slide projector or relatively powerful "magic lantern", which has two lenses, usually one above the other, and has mainly been used to project photographic images. These devices date back to the mid 19th century, and were a popular form of entertainment and education before the advent of moving pictures.
Pepper's ghost is an illusion technique used in the theatre, cinema, amusement parks, museums, television, and concerts.
A peep show or peepshow is a presentation of a live sex show or pornographic film which is viewed through a viewing slot.
The phenakistiscope was the first widespread animation device that created a fluent illusion of motion. Dubbed Fantascope and Stroboscopische Scheiben by its inventors, it has been known under many other names until the French product name Phénakisticope became common. The phenakistiscope is regarded as one of the first forms of moving media entertainment that paved the way for the future motion picture and film industry. Like a GIF animation, it can only show a short continuous loop.
Samuel Dirksz van Hoogstraten was a Dutch painter of the Golden Age, who was also a poet and author on art theory.
Peep Show or Peepshow may refer to:
Anamorphosis is a distorted projection requiring the viewer to occupy a specific vantage point, use special devices, or both to view a recognizable image. It is used in painting, photography, sculpture and installation, toys, and film special effects. The word is derived from the Greek prefix ana-, meaning "back" or "again", and the word morphe, meaning "shape" or "form". Extreme anamorphosis has been used by artists to disguise caricatures, erotic and scatological scenes, and other furtive images from a casual spectator, while revealing an undistorted image to the knowledgeable viewer.
Precursors of film are concepts and devices that have much in common with the later art and techniques of cinema.
Cantastoria comes from Italian for "story-singer" and is known by many other names around the world. It is a theatrical form where a performer tells or sings a story while gesturing to a series of images. These images can be painted, printed or drawn on any sort of material.
The Red Spectacles is a 1987 Japanese film directed by Mamoru Oshii, co-written with Kazunori Ito, and starring Shigeru Chiba and Mako Hyodo.
A zograscope is an optical device for magnifying flat pictures that also has the property of enhancing the sense of the depth shown in the picture. It consists of a large magnifying lens through which the picture is viewed. Devices containing only the lens are sometimes referred to as graphoscopes. Other models have the lens mounted on a stand in front of an angled mirror. This allows someone to sit at a table and to look through the lens at the picture flat on the table. Pictures viewed in this way need to be left-right reversed; this is obvious in the case of writing. A print made for this purpose, typically with extensive graphical projection perspective, is called a vue d'optique or "perspective view".
The Museum of Precinema is a museum in the Palazzo Angeli, Prato della Valle, Padua, Italy, related to the history of precinema, or precursors of film. It was created in 1998 to display the Minici Zotti Collection, in collaboration with the Comune di Padova. It also produces interactive touring exhibitions and makes valuable loans to other prestigious exhibitions such as 'Lanterne magique et film peint' at the Cinémathèque Française in Paris and the Museum of Cinema in Turin.
A projector or image projector is an optical device that projects an image onto a surface, commonly a projection screen. Most projectors create an image by shining a light through a small transparent lens, but some newer types of projectors can project the image directly, by using lasers. A virtual retinal display, or retinal projector, is a projector that projects an image directly on the retina instead of using an external projection screen.
In Japanese art, a megane-e is a print designed using graphical perspective techniques and viewed through a convex lens to produce a three-dimensional effect. The term derives from the French vue d'optique. The device used to view them was called an Oranda megane or nozoki megane, and the pictures were also known as karakuri-e.
Dissolving views were a popular type of 19th century magic lantern show exhibiting the gradual transition from one projected image to another. The effect is similar to a dissolve in modern filmmaking. Typical examples had landscapes that dissolved from day to night or from summer to winter. The effect was achieved by aligning the projection of two matching images and slowly diminishing the first image while introducing the second image. The subject and the effect of magic lantern dissolving views is similar to the popular Diorama theatre paintings which originated in Paris in 1822. The terms "dissolving views", "dioramic views", or simply "diorama" were often used interchangeably in 19th century magic lantern playbills.
Chinese fireworks or paper fireworks, also known by the French terms feux pyriques or feux arabesques, is a type of optical toy box that displays pictures with twinkling light effects. The pictures are partly printed or painted and partly perforated into plates that are made of paper, parchment or cardboard. Different plates can be placed in the front of the box, one by one. A wheel with a spiraling pattern on coloured transparent paper is made to rotate between a light source and the picture plates, causing the light to flicker and move in different colours through the perforations in the plates.
An accidental viewpoint is a singular position from which an image can be perceived, creating either an ambiguous image or an illusion. The image perceived at this angle is viewpoint-specific, meaning it cannot be perceived at any other position, known as generic or non-accidental viewpoints. These view-specific angles are involved in object recognition. In its uses in art and other visual illusions, the accidental viewpoint creates the perception of depth often on a two-dimensional surface with the assistance of monocular cues.
The history of animation started long before the development of cinematography. Humans have probably attempted to depict motion as far back as the paleolithic period. Much later, shadow play and the magic lantern offered popular shows with projected images on a screen, moving as the result of manipulation by hand and/or minor mechanics. In 1833, the stroboscopic disc introduced the stroboscopic principles of modern animation, which decades later would also provide the basis for cinematography. This article covers the period up to 1888, when celluloid film base was developed, a technology that would become the foundation for over a century of film.