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The illusionism of Pepper's Ghost brings the Middle Ages to life

The CEMEC network for the two-year period 2018 - 2019 has organized a traveling exhibition on the Early Middle Ages with stops in the museums of Athens, Amsterdam, Budapest, Bonn and Brussels, among the preparations prepared, the holographic showcase of one of the most precious and evocative objects stands out of the exhibition: the sword that belonged to an Avar warrior chief who lived in the mid-XNUMXth century AD, the so-called Kunagota sword.

The illusionism of Pepper's Ghost brings the Middle Ages to life

For Christmas of 1862, he went staged in London theatres The haunted man di Charles Dickens. But, it was not the usual representation. This time, theadaptation of the novelChristmas di Dickens collected a particular success, and this thanks to an innovation isfirst went into theater: the illusionistic technique call Pepper's Ghost, from the name of its creator John Henry Pepper.

The spectators they stayed very impressed with this sort of virtual reality before its timewhich gave the illusion – through the use of a glass plate placed between the viewer and the reflecting sceneva a sthidden action from the spectator – to see on stage not onlyappear persontoday eoobjects, but to see them disappear and then even turn theone into the other.

Holograms would be invented many years later by the Hungarian physicist Dennis gaborbut perception and the impression of a three-dimensional vision was already present in this one new illusionistic technique.

And the magic of Pepper's Ghost also survived subsequent technological revolutions. From the apparition - in half ofnineteenth century - in theatres, the phantasmagorical technique continues even in the XNUMXst century to arouse wonder and be a source of inspiration. As in the case of one of the most interesting projects presented for the celebration in 2018 “of theEuropean year of cultural heritage": CEMEC (Connecting Early Medieval European Collections). l'year of production 2018 motto was chosen “where the past meets the future”, motto that collimates perfectly with the objectives of the CEMEC project: to create a European network of museum institutions specialized in the Early Middle Ages, but above all develop a new one museum storytelling through implementation of holographic windows  based its on technique of Pepper's Ghost.

According to the scientific manager of the project, Eva Pietroni: “The traditional communicative approach of museums often uses cro criteriaNo.logical rather than narrative" and then to make a new tipor museum narration, it is necessary: "virtually reconstructing a sensory dimension around the exhibited object and bringing the public to the center of a perceptive, cognitive and emotional experience is today the most stimulating line of research for museums. Thus the museum it becomes a real dramaturgical space". And here it entersNo. in play the holographic showcases that through holographic projections - that is taking advantage of the Pepper's Ghost – they turn into real “story boxes” capable of narrating – rather than describing – not only the Story but also the context and symbols evoked by exhibited artifact.  

Pepper's Ghost

The dramatic representation of the precious artefact, through holographic projections, develops in three acts. In the first "History", attention is focused on the real museum object that interacts with multimedia captions and ingranyou forget virtual decorative details. In the second act "the Life", the dramatization begins through the creation and the story of the sword: the process of creation s'intertwines with the human events from which it derives, and the same figures engraved on the gold plates they cover the sword come alive and they become protagonists.

Holographic projections produce – as with the Pepper's Ghost technique in London theaters – the ma effectgame of the illusion of reality.

E in the holographic showcase they appear including by magic hands of women who furtively scrutinize the contents of a casket, splashes of blood produced by swordplay, and then the hand of the dying father who raises the sword and offers it to his son to decorate it and thus be ready to accompany him in the 'beyond.

Finally,  with "The Farewell and the Kingdom of Tengri", the "story box" of the Kunagota sword reaches the third act. Here the hologram contextualizes the object in the tomb of origin and transports visitors to the afterlife based on the vision that the ancient shamans of Asian origin had of it. The Spirit of the Warrior (an actor reprized in chroma key and inserted in the virtual scene) whispers to the visitors that the time has come for the burial and for his final departure in the blue sky of the ancestors.

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