MCiT successful

  1. Optical Unconscious
     Photography reveals things unseen by the human eye, exposing both visual worlds and human limitations

  2. Seeing and Not Seeing
     Photography brings into focus what lies beyond natural vision while highlighting cultural blind spots and what remains unseen     

  3. Spirit Photography
     Nineteenth-century photographs claimed to capture spirits, reflecting photography's ability to explore hidden and unseen realms  

  4. Photography and Race
     Photography reinforced racial visibility and invisibility, hyper-focusing on Blackness while rendering whiteness as "natural" and invisible     

  5. Technological Expansion of Vision
     Photography extended human sight but revealed its limits, highlighting a partially perceived world  

  6. Deprofessionalisation of Portrait Photography
     The introduction of smaller cameras and accessible photographic processes allowed amateurs to create portraits, reducing reliance on professional photographers     

  7. Mechanical Objectivity
     The camera became a symbol of objectivity, capturing "truth" through mechanical means without human artistic interpretation   

  8. Phenakistoscope (1832)
     Early optical toy creating an illusion of movement through spinning discs     

  9. Zoetrope (1833)
     A revolving drum with sequential drawings producing the illusion of motion     

  10. Magic Lanterns
     Devices used since the 17th century to project images on surfaces, a precursor to cinema

  11. Kinetoscope (1891)
    Edison and Dickson's device for individual film viewing, using 35 mm film

  12. Cinématographe (1895)
     Lumière brothers’ invention combining a camera, printer, and projector into one device  

  13. Eadweard Muybridge Motion Studies
     Used sequential cameras to capture animals' movement, laying foundations for motion pictures     

  14. Reducing Exposure Time
     Advances in photography allowed shorter exposure times, enabling the analysis of motion and dynamic sequences     

  15. Chronophotography (Marey)
     Sequential photography that captured movement for scientific study and motion analysis     

  16. Denaturalization
     Photographic and cinematic techniques disrupted habitual perception, rendering familiar objects and movements strange and unfamiliar     

  17. Natural Magic
     Intellectual tradition blending science and spectacle to explain natural phenomena with optical devices        

  18. Magic Lantern (1659)
     Early projector using hand-painted glass slides to create moving images, later popularized for entertainment     

  19. Peepshow Boxes
     Intimate optical devices providing visual storytelling experiences through small openings        

  20. Persistence of Vision
     The principle behind motion illusion, seen in devices like the zoetrope and phenakistoscope        

  21. Phantasmagoria
     Eerie lantern shows projecting ghostly images, blending science with occult spectacle     

  22. Abstraction of Art
     Moving images and optical illusions contributed to art’s abstraction, emphasizing the visual spectacle over realism        

  23. Screen Practices
     Visual storytelling methods using projection and screens, including shadow plays and panoramas        

  24. Interactive Media Origins
     Touch-based practices with optical devices like the zoetrope foreshadow modern interactivity in digital media        

  25. Camera Obscura
     Early optical device projecting external scenes onto a surface, used as a tool for art and spectacle