Rooted in the ERC project Science at the Fair: Performing Knowledge and Technology in Western Europe (1850-1914), this lecture discusses the vibrant yet elusive world of nineteenth-century fairgrounds as hubs of cultural exchange, blending entertainment, science, technology, and visual culture. However, the scarcity and dispersion of source materials and artefacts presents substantial challenges for its historical research.
Three case studies illustrate the approaches involved in locating and analyzing a diverse range of relevant source materials, including flyers, trade journals, and paintings: (1) unearthing fairground ephemera in the Brussels’ antique circuit, (2) digitizing Der Komet, a pioneering trade journal for fairground professionals, and (3) investigating the cosmorama paintings of itinerant artist Carl Enslen. Throughout these cases, I will highlight how digital tools—online databases, digitization, and relational databases—serve as complementary resources in the (re)search of nineteenth-century fairground materials.
Bart G. Moens is an art and media historian specializing in the intersection of the arts and popular media from the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries. He completed his Ph.D. in 2023 at the Université libre de Bruxelles with the dissertation Emotions on Demand: Melodramatic Structures of Feeling in Optical Lantern Culture (1890s-1920s), which is currently being revised for publication by Brepols Publishers. Bart is now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Antwerp, where he contributes to the ERC-funded project Science at the Fair: Performing Knowledge and Technology in Western Europe (1850-1914). His research within the project explores the circulation of visual culture at nineteenth-century European fairgrounds, focusing on early immersive media such as panoramas, cosmoramas, and stereoscopes.
Wednesday, 26 February 2025
14.00 - 15.00
C²DH Open Space, 4th floor Maison des Sciences humaines, Belval Campus
and online
