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Panoramic paintings during the Romantic Era captured all 360 degrees of a scene. Typically shown in rotundas for viewing, panoramas were meant to be so lifelike they confused the spectator between what was real and what was image.
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Creation of the Panorama
Robert Barker conceived the concept of the panorama in 1787. While walking on a hill overlooking Edinburgh, the idea struck him and he obtained a patent for it the same year. Barker’s vision was to capture the magnificence of a scene from every angle so as to immerse the spectator completely, and in so doing, blur the line where art stopped and reality began. Barker’s first panorama was of Edinburgh. He exhibited the Panorama of Edinburgh in his house in 1788, but to little success. The first panorama disappointed Barker, not because of its lack of success, but because it fell short of his vision. The Edinburgh scene was not a full 360 degrees; it was semi-circular. After the limited success of his first panorama, Barker and his son Henry Aston Barker completed a panorama of London from the Albion Mills. A reduced version was originally shown in their house with a larger one on display later.
To fulfill his dream of a 360 panorama, Barker and his son purchased a rotunda at Leicester Square. London from the Roof of the Albion Mills christened the new rotunda, all 250 square meters of it. The previously reduced version, in contrast, measured only 137 square meters. The rotunda at Leicester Square was composed of two levels, although they varied in size. Spectators observed the scenes from a platform in the center of the rotunda. The main goal of the panorama was to immerse the audience to the point where they could not tell the difference between the canvas and reality, in other words, wholeness. To accomplish this, all borders of the canvas had to be concealed. Props were also strategically positioned in the foreground of the scene to increase realism. Two windows laid into the roof allowed natural light to flood the canvases, also making the illusion more realistic. Two scenes could be exhibited at the rotunda in Leicester Square simultaneously, however the rotunda at Leicester Square was the only rotunda to house two panoramas. Houses with single scenes proved more popular. While at Leicester Square, the audience was herded down a long, dark corridor to clear their minds. The idea was to have spectators more or less forget what they just saw, leaving their minds blank to view the second scene. Despite the audience’s “mind blanking” walk in the dark, panoramas were designed to have a lingering effect upon the viewer. For some, this attribute placed panoramas in the same category as propaganda of the period: no more than an illusion meant to deceive. The panorama evolved somewhat and in 1809, the moving panorama graced the stage in Edinburgh. Unlike its predecessor, the moving panorama required a large canvas and two vertical rollers. The scene or variation of scenes passed before the audience between the rollers, eliminating the need to showcase and view the panoramas in a rotunda. Peter Marshall added the twist to Barker’s original creation, which saw success throughout the 19th and into the 20th century. Despite the success of the moving panorama, Barker's original vision maintained popularity through various artists, including Pierre Prévost, Charles Langlois and Henri Félix Emmanuel Philippoteaux among others. The revival in popularity for the panorama peaked in the 1880s, having spread through Europe and North America.
Cultural Response
In the late 18th and early 19th century, the panorama attracted a diverse audience partly because an extensive education was not required to view panoramas. On the contrary, it was an art form that could be appreciated by anyone mainly because they depicted scenes. People could immerse themselves in the scene and take part in what became known as the locality paradox. The locality paradox refers to the phenomenon where spectators are so taken with the panorama they cannot distinguish where they are: Leicester Square or, for example, the Albion Mills. This association with delusion was a common critique of panoramas. Writers feared the panorama for the simplicity of its illusion. Hester Piozzi was among those who rebelled against the growing popularity of the panorama for precisely this reason. She did not like seeing so many people – distinguished and otherwise – fooled by something so simple. Another problem with the panorama is what it came to be associated with, namely, it redefined the sublime to incorporate the material. By associating the sublime with the material, the panorama was seen as a threat – the sublime was never supposed to include any materiality. The subjects of panoramas transformed as time passed, becoming less about the sublime and more about military battles and biblical scenes. This was especially true during the Napoleonic era when panoramas often displayed scenes from the emperor’s latest battle whether a victory or a crushing defeat such as depicted in the Battle of Waterloo in 1816.
Panoramas and Romanticism
In their earliest forms, panoramas depicted topographical scenes. Breathtaking sights immediately link panoramas with romanticism, which is known for its reverence toward the sublime. Despite this similarity, the poet William Wordsworth has long been associated as an opponent of the panorama, most notably for his allusion to it in Book Seven of The Prelude. It has been argued that Wordsworth’s problem with the panorama was the deceit it involved. He felt, critics say, the panorama not only exhibited an immense scene of some kind, but also the weakness of human intelligence. It is safe to assume Wordsworth saw a panorama at some point during his life, but it is unknown which it was. Situation as it is, there is no substantial proof he ever went, but his response to it seems too grounded upon experience to suggest otherwise. Wordsworth's opposition is to the awe-inspiring scenes of the panorama and of other spectacles of the period that competed with such scenes in real life. He sought to separate poetry from the phantasmagoria enveloping the population. This was perhaps Wordsworth’s biggest problem with panoramas: their popularity. For Wordsworth, panoramas more or less brainwashed their audiences. The panorama lulled spectators into stupors, inhibiting their ability to imagine things for themselves. Wordsworth wanted people to see the representation and appreciate it for what it was – art. Conversely, J. Jennifer Jones argues Wordsworth was not opposed to the panorama, but rather hesitant about it. In her essay, “Absorbing Hesitation: Wordsworth and the Theory of the Panorama,” Jones argues that other episodes of The Prelude have just as much sensory depth as panoramas are supposed to have had. Jones studied how Wordsworth imitated the senses in The Prelude, much in the same way panoramas did. She concluded that panoramas were a balancing act between what the senses absorbed and what they came away with, something also present in Wordsworth’s poetry. By her results then, Wordsworth’s similar imitation of the senses proves he was not entirely opposed to them.