Seminar Machines and Imagination, 2012-2013
Electricity and imagination
5 December 2012, 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Laboratoire SPHERE (University Paris Diderot 7 / CNRS)
Bâtiment Condorcet, 4 rue Elsa Morante, 75013 Paris
Room Mondrian 646A (6th floor)
organization: Pierre Cassou-Noguès, Viktoria Tkaczyk, Koen Vermeir
guest organizer: Christian Carletti
09:00 - 09:30
Koen Vermeir (SPHERE), Christian Carletti (SPHERE)
Electrical machines and imagination
09:30 - 11:00
Paolo Brenni (National Research Council - CNR, Florence)
Fairies, Lightnings and Dynamos: Symbols and Allegories in the History of Electricity
Ulf Otto (Stiftung Universität Hildesheim)
‘Pandora oder Götter-Funken’. Electricity as Pantomime
11:00 – 11:30 break
11:30 – 1:00
Christine Blondel (Centre Koyré, Paris)
Which Representations for Electrical "Healing Machines" in Late 19th Century France:
Between Scientific Precision, Consecration and Nightmare
Baptiste Brun (Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense)
Art brut and electricity: an anti-modern iconography?
1:00 – 2:30 lunch
2:30 – 4:00
Remko Scha (University of Amsterdam)
Electric Power and the Human Body
Sam Halliday (Queen Mary, University of London)
Bipolarity and Sexuality
4:00 – 4:15 break
4:15 – 5:00
Laura Ludtke (University of Oxford)
Electric Lights, New Mesmerism, and the Spectacle of Science in Richard Marsh's ‘The Beetle’ (1897)