of the University of Cologne
If you see the peep box man in town, a grateful audience is not far behind. Curious men, antsy children, and fawning women all push forth to peek into his “dark box”. What a wonderful device. During the Enlightenment, between 1720 and 1800, ever more people were yearning for an education. This “seeing machine” could be used to present knowledge of the big, wide world in an entertaining way and without great effort. Peep boxes, camera obscuras, and other “optical curiosities” were, at the time, widespread trailblazers for modern televisions. The underlying concept is simple: The viewer looks through a small opening in the entirely uninteresting exterior and, via mirrors and magnifying lenses, sees fascinating images of objects, views of faraway lands and cities, and depictions of historical events. Depending on the incidence of light, these could be seen head-on (for full effect) or backlit. Augsburg publisher Martin Engelbrecht (1684–1759) had a particularly clever way to fool the viewers’ senses: He adapted the peep box with a successive series of paper cut-outs that gave the impression of spatial depth. This was how, in the days before the 24-hour news cycle, one could still feel their body shake as though they were on site in Lisbon during the terrible earthquake in 1755. This and other objects from the collection of historical visual media, belonging to the legendary filmmaker Werner Nekes (1944–2017) and now presented by the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum & Fondation Corboud, can be seen in the exhibit “The Sensation of Sight” until 23 April 2023.