SYDNEY

Jean-Claude SEGUIN

Sydney est la capitale de la Nouvelle Galles du Sud (Australie). 

1894

Le Kinetoscope de J. C. Williamson et des frères MacMahon (148, Pitt Street, 30 novembre-31 décembre 1894) →1895

Dans les derniers jours du mois de décembre, la presse annonce l'arrivée à Sydney du kinetoscope rapporté des États-Unis par J. C. Williamson :

THE KINETOSCOPE.
Edison's latest marvel has arrived in Sydney, and will be on exhibition in a few days. It was decided by the combined companies owning the rights of the kinetoscope mat its introduction to the public should be practically simultaneous through out the world. Mr. J. C. Williamson, during his recent visit to America, secured the Australian rights of this remarkable invention, full particulars of which will very shortly be given to the public. Meanwhile it may be noted that American exchanges are devoting large and exhaustive articles to the exhibitions which are now taking place in America.

The Australian Star, Sydney, samedi 24 novembre 1894, p. 6.

sydney kinetoscope 1894 novembre
The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, samedi 24 novembre 1894, p. 2.

Le salon est ouvert le 20 novembre :

THE KINETOSCOPE.
The Ant day's exhibition of the kinetoscope in Pitt-street attracted a constant stream of visitors, so that, except during yesterday afternoon, when the attendance slackened, the management put through more than 50 persons per hour on the five machines. This latest " marvel of the age " thus shows every sign of permanent popularity.

The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, samedi 1er décembre 1894, p. 10.

Le même jour, The Daily Telegraph consacre un très long article au salon du kinetoscope où fonctionnent cinq appareils.

THE KINETOSCOPE.
PHOTOGRAPHY IN MOTION.
E DYSON'S LATEST TRIUMPH.
The kinetoscope, which the Messrs. M'Mahon have just introduced to Sydney, is another materialisation of Edison's genius. Entering the building in Pitt-street, half a dozen steps above King-street, you see five cabinet-shaped stands. Each is a separate kinetoscope. Glancing through the aperture fixed for the eyes, you have a view of one of the most striking and marvellous novelties that scientific invention has yet produced. Take the first. Miss Anna Belle, of New York, is performing the butterfly dance. Every movement of the limbs, every wave of drapery, are exhibited with absolute exactitude. If you were not already assured that the figure was the handiwork of man, and if it was not so reduced in size, you might be forgiven for imagining for the moment that it was the miniature of a reality. So it is for that matter. The graces of style, the continuity of the dancer's movements, and the most minute flourishes are produced with perfection.
sydney kinetoscope 1894 decembre 01
Adjoining is a representation of a forge and a blacksmith shoeing a horse. The affect was not so good in this instance yesterday because of the defective light. But there was sufficient to show every detail of the operation. The horse itself, the blacksmith driving on the shoe, and the assistant or the owner, or whatever he may be, whisking files from the animal, are given with the utmost fidelity. Another sketch, whose faithfulness will appeal strongly to the Sydney visitor shows the Colombian wire walker Caicedo, who was at the Lyceum last summer, going through some of his tricks. His peculiar method is exactly depicted. He holds the balancing pole in his hands, he walks along the wire, he turns a somersault, he twists his body round and returns. The whole effect is admirably produced. It is Caicedo just as he was at the Lyceum. There is hardly sufficient opportunity in one view to examine the movements in detail. Indeed, this is inevitable. The scientific process by which a series of photographs impresses itself upon the eye as one continuous pictures renders it impossible. The succession of reproductions is so swift that you have just sufficient time to take in the sketch as a finished illustration, when the darkness closes in and it has vanished.
Perhaps the most elaborate and best sketch Is the interior of a barber's shop and the operation of shaving. The customer enters, takes off his coat, gets into a chair; another comes in, picks up the paper and starts a conversation. It is all compressed into a picture which a few square inches would cover. But the procedure is correct and life-like to every trivial inch lent. The new arrival in seen reading his newspaper, cracking his joke, and exchanging traveller's fictions with the rest of the company. There is one episode absent from the photographic representation of the reality. It's Impossible to hear the barber's comments on the last football match, or his inquiries touching the winner of the Derby. It is only when Edison's scientific genius accomplishes this feat that he will be looked upon as a scourge to humanity. The last kinetoscopic reproduction is a cockfight. The two roosters are in the thick of the struggle. A humane person is egging them on to the destruction of each other. The flying limbs, the bristling feathers, the vicious attack, and the destructive repulse are graphically displayed to tho excited spectator. The whole exhibition is certainly worth seeing as much for its novelty as for its scientific worth.
sydney kinetoscope 1894 decembre 02
How is all this effect produced in the first instance? you will ask. Mr. Edison has a stage upon which the performances he reproduces are enacted. These performances are recorded by taking a series of 48 photographs in rapid succession, the time occupied in taking them being one second only. Thus every progressive phase of every single action is secured, and the photographs are successively reproduced on a film of celluloid of the length required for recording a given scene. When this film is passed before the eye at the same rate of speed as that at which the photographs were taken, the photographically disjointed parts of a given action are united in one complete whole.
Thus, supposing a person to be photographed taking off his coat — as is done in one case — the successive views representing the phase of action at every 43rd part of a second are joined up, and the complete operation of taking off the coat is presented to the eye as it would appear in reality. In other words, the kinetoscope is a perfect reproduction of living action, without sound. The apparatus in which this reproduction takes place is a cabinet about 4ft. high, 2ft. wide, and 1ft. 9in. deep. It contains the celluloid film band, the apparatus for reconstructing the disjointed views, and an electric motor for driving the apparatus. The chief detail of the mechanism is a flat metal ring having a slot in it, which makes about 2000 resolutions per minute. The film passes rapidly over the ring, beneath which is an electric light. The spectator looks through a lens on to the film, and every action recorded on it passes under his view.

The Daily Telegraph, Sydney, samedi 1er décembre 1894, p. 9.
Les projections se prolongent jusqu'à la fin de l'année :

THE KINETOSCOPE
The Kinetoscope Exhibition in Pitt-street comprises at present the Cock Fight, the Boxing Cats, and Ary Armand's Café Chanson interlude, with other animated subjects. The French comédienne's comic action is essentially Gallic, giving the spectator a vivid idea of the kind of gesture popular with the frequenters of the Boulevards; and all the Kinetoscope subjects furnish food for admiration or mirth.


The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, samedi 29 décembre 1894, p. 5.

Répertoire (autres titres): Professor Welton's boxing cats, A new interior of a blacksmith's forge, Sandow the strong man, Armond Ary (The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, lundi 10 décembre 1894, p. 6).

→ 1895