The Monitor. [volume] (Woodstown, N.J.) 1884-1892, 1889-11-01
INVENTED PAN0RAMAS.
1T IS SAID THAT A ScoTcHMAN
FIRST PAINTED THEM.


apt-The Panorama of Joan of Arc
Robert Barker is generally credited
with being the first painterof panoramas
as we know them today. He was born
in Edinburgh, where he lived for sixty
years during the last century. Originally
he made his living by painting portraits,
and it is said of him that the first notion
of a picture that would take in the entire
scene visible from q certain point on
every side occurred to him when he was
sitting on the top of Carlton hill in
Scotland's capital. He went home and
began painting on a cylindrical surfaces
picture of the town as it appears to any
sedy viewing !. from that famous emf
nence, which would include Arthura
seat, the Castle Rock and the distant
Firth of Forth.
SIR JOSHUA CONVINCED.
His first picture was on paper pasted
on to linen. He came to London with 1t,
and invoked the patronage of Sir Joshua
REYNOLDS, who declared the plan of such
a picture SO impracticable that he would
willingly, lie said, get out of his bed at
night time to inspect the work of art If
it could be produced. When Barker did
actually surmount all difficulties and
opened his panoramic exhibition in
Castle street, Leicester square, skepticai
Sir Joshua was as good, or almost as
good, as his promise. He sailed forth
one morning in his slippers from his
breakfast table to see the marvel, and,
--. .za.-aI 1o,,Io. DEMONSTRATION
that a panorama was a possibility, gen
erously congratulated the artist on his
success.
The first picture IA painted in a cir
Gle, the diameter of which was twenty
five feet, but afterwards Barker became
more ambitious. He had succeeded with
Edinburgh, why should he not try Lon
don? This he at once set to work doing,
and he produced a picture taken from
an elevated position in the old Albion
mills, near Blackfriars' bridge. BY dint
of sspegging away" and with the assist
ance of one or two kindly and wealthy
patrons, such as Lord Elcho, Barker had
contrived to snatch pecuniary success
out of the jaws of apparent failure, and
five years after he arrived in London, in
1893, he took the lease of a piece of
ground in Granhourn street and erected
thereon q large building simply and
solely for the purpose of exhibiting his
panoramast there. A joint stock company
helped him to find funds for this build
ing, where he had three rooms, in the
largest of which the diameter of the pic
ture was ninety feet. and the chief open
ing attraction was a representation of
a review of the fleet at Spithead. This
succeeded so we'll that the inventive Bar
ker bought up the shares in his w com
pany and became sole proprietor.
From this time onward the Eeiceters
square panorama was n of the lions of
London, and its inventor having made a
thoroughly good thing cut of it, and
having pleased and improved the minds
of countless spectators, died in the year
1906, leaving his profitable occupation to
his son, Henry Aston Barker, "who kept
on the business still, resigned" or not as
the case might be, unto the heavenly
will" At all events Barker the younger
was a conscientious panoramist, for he
journeyed all over Europe in his search
for subjects" He 'panoramed' Malta
and Elba, and in the course of his visit
to the latter place interviewed the great
Napoleon. He illustrated Nelson's most
famous sea fights, and he went to Con
stantinople and Waterloo to make draw
ings of each.
II i PICTURE IN PARIS.
From Waterloo he journeyed on to
Paris, which the allied troops were then
occupying, in order to obtain perfectly
correct accounts of the dispositions of
the forces from the actual leaders in the
fight. As no inventor is sever allowed to
be the first in the field, it may be well,
in the interests of historical accuracy, to
saythat Robert Bankers fame is troubled
by a rival discoverer of panoramas, one
Professor Breisig, of Danzig; but it is
acknowledged that Barker was the first
actually to paint and exhibit a panoram-
ic picture on q large scale.
The latest development of the pane
ramic art is to be seen, along with other
wonders, at Paris. Patriotism has in
spired some enterprising Gaul with the
very happy thought of seizing the oppor-
tunity for interesting his countrymen
and women and the whole world in the
story of Joan of Arc. He has according
~ had painted and is exhibiting q colos-
sal and beautiful panorama of the life o.
the Maid of Orleans in several scene
Realism is, of course, to the fore, and
during the battle scenes before Orleans
the peal Of trurnpets is heard, while the
painting of the groups of figures in the
coronation scene at Rheims and in other
episodes is said to be ~marvelously life
like. This panorama, if it does nothing
else, affords an agreeable way of learn
ing the chief facts in the life of 4 greas
historical character.
Many people will wish that they could
learn all their history in the same easy
fashion. To have we'll painted tableauS
pass in succession before one, each de
picting a famous scene in a great drama
of actual life. is not a contemplate aid
to education. If there is any lecturipg
to be done the lecturers remarks are liz
tened to with far more patience when tie
eye has all the tirGe before it the actual
scene of which mention is being made.
Even a humorist like Artemus Ward
found that his comic addresses went
much better when aided by u panorama,
in which a comic moon that tried to rise
and got stuck half way up the sky added
to the total effect. London Telegraph.