Description
The Museo del Precinema tells how the world went "to the movies" before movies existed. It is in Palazzo Angeli, overlooking Prato della Valle in Padua, and holds the Minici Zotti Collection: magic lanterns, optical views, visual games and tricks from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The heart of the collection is the magic lanterns, the ancestors of the projector, used to entertain and educate audiences. There are all kinds, from all over, from W. Tyler's double lantern to the American "The Pettibone", with their original hand-painted glass slides.
Alongside them are the optical views for the Mondo Nuovo, dating back to the eighteenth century. Don't miss the megalethoscope of 1864, devised by Carlo Ponti, one of the first photographers working in Venice.
One section is devoted to stereoscopy and anaglyphs, pictures that seem to leap off the paper, with antique cameras and a camera obscura. Then come the optical toys with impossible names, like the zoetrope, praxinoscope, thaumatrope and phenakistiscope: the first steps of animation.
The fun is seeing how little has changed: the principles behind these machines are the same as those of today's cartoons and 3D images. Back then, every discovery in optics instantly became a show for the general public, in town squares and royal courts alike.
The museum was born in 1998 out of the passion of Laura Minici Zotti, artist and "lanternist". From the 1970s until 2010 she toured the world with her magic lantern shows, inspired by those of the Victorian era, just as the nineteenth-century lanternists used to do.
In 2018, for the museum's twentieth anniversary, she handed the directorship to her son Carlo Alberto, who teaches the history and technique of photography at the University of Padua. Pieces from the collection have also been lent to the Cinémathèque française in Paris and the Museo Nazionale del Cinema in Turin.
The collection has grown so much that some parts, such as the shadow theatre of the Parisian cabaret Le Chat Noir, can only be seen in full in temporary exhibitions elsewhere. The museum also organises interactive travelling exhibitions.
The heart of the collection is the magic lanterns, the ancestors of the projector, used to entertain and educate audiences. There are all kinds, from all over, from W. Tyler's double lantern to the American "The Pettibone", with their original hand-painted glass slides.
Alongside them are the optical views for the Mondo Nuovo, dating back to the eighteenth century. Don't miss the megalethoscope of 1864, devised by Carlo Ponti, one of the first photographers working in Venice.
One section is devoted to stereoscopy and anaglyphs, pictures that seem to leap off the paper, with antique cameras and a camera obscura. Then come the optical toys with impossible names, like the zoetrope, praxinoscope, thaumatrope and phenakistiscope: the first steps of animation.
The fun is seeing how little has changed: the principles behind these machines are the same as those of today's cartoons and 3D images. Back then, every discovery in optics instantly became a show for the general public, in town squares and royal courts alike.
The museum was born in 1998 out of the passion of Laura Minici Zotti, artist and "lanternist". From the 1970s until 2010 she toured the world with her magic lantern shows, inspired by those of the Victorian era, just as the nineteenth-century lanternists used to do.
In 2018, for the museum's twentieth anniversary, she handed the directorship to her son Carlo Alberto, who teaches the history and technique of photography at the University of Padua. Pieces from the collection have also been lent to the Cinémathèque française in Paris and the Museo Nazionale del Cinema in Turin.
The collection has grown so much that some parts, such as the shadow theatre of the Parisian cabaret Le Chat Noir, can only be seen in full in temporary exhibitions elsewhere. The museum also organises interactive travelling exhibitions.