Optical Vacuum - Spectatorship and Modernized American Theater Architecture

From the 1920s-1960s, American cinematic architecture underwent a seismic shift: movie theaters were neutralized for immersive watching, in large part by architect and writer Benjamin Schlanger. The Optical Vacuum examines how Schlanger reformed both theater and spectator, demonstrating that the essence of film viewing can be found in theatrical space.

About the author

Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece is Assistant Professor of English and Film Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Her research focuses on spectatorship, exhibition, technology, and American film history, and she has published in various journals and books including Screen, Film History, Color and the Moving Image, World Picture, and 2ha.

Summary

From the 1920s-1960s, American cinematic architecture underwent a seismic shift: movie theaters were neutralized for immersive watching, in large part by architect and writer Benjamin Schlanger. The Optical Vacuum examines how Schlanger reformed both theater and spectator, demonstrating that the essence of film viewing can be found in theatrical space.

Additional text

Movie theaters are not just places to see a film. They are sites in which to experience new technologies, explore immersive environments and to innovate new modes of seeing and hearing. This fascinating book shows us that movie theaters have long been irretrievably shaped by dynamic debates across fields such as modernism, architecture, design, and commercial entertainment, inviting us to look beyond the screen and at the spaces in which movies have long been embedded. This book is essential reading for those interested in the history of theaters and cinema, as well as those interested in modernity, entertainment, and the persistent transformation of the human senses by technological design.

Product details

• Authors: Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece, Jocelyn (Assistant Professor Szczepaniak-Gillece
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 30.09.2018
• EAN: 9780190689353
• ISBN: 978-0-19-068935-3
• No. of pages: 210
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Art > Plastic arts; USA, Architectural structure & design, Public buildings: civic, commercial, industrial, etc, PERFORMING ARTS / Theater / History & Criticism, ART / Performance, United States of America, USA, PERFORMING ARTS / Film / History & Criticism, Film Theory & Criticism, Architectural structure and design, Film history, theory or criticism, Architecture: public, commercial and industrial buildings