The Telectroscope
22 May – 15 June 2008, New York / London
Paul St. George’s quirky pseudo-Victorian creation linked Brooklyn and London via a transatlantic tunnel and two giant telescopes.
The Telectroscope was the brainchild of British artist Paul St. George. The contraption claimed to link London and New York by means of a transatlantic tunnel and a large number of mirrors. The tunnel had been dug over a hundred years previously by St. George’s ancestor. It was up to us to reveal it.
Thousands of people invested in the illusion that they were looking through a tunnel at the other side of the world. In reality, the two cities were joined using a fast broadband connection. The broadband connection was provided by our sponsors Tiscali. There was virtually no visible delay between the time zones: a major achievement considering the scale of the project. The Telectroscope remained open 24 hours a day for almost a month, during which it received around 50,000 visitors.
Some people made new friends, some connected with old ones. One woman, on a business trip in the USA, was able to see her daughter on her birthday thanks to the Telectroscope. This strange contraption and alternative reality captured the imaginations of audiences on both sides of the Atlantic.
The Artist
Paul St. George is a multimedia artist and sculptor. His projects include Minumentals, Revelation and Sequences. His work has been toured across the UK. He is also the Principal Lecturer in Art, Media and Design at London Metropolitan University.
St. George takes much of his inspiration from the many inventions that bloomed at the end of the nineteenth century. He is equally fascinated by the multi-faceted relationships between viewer and viewed. The Telectroscope can be said to be the culmination of these dual interests.
You can find out more about Paul St. George by visiting his website.
Website: www.talktalk.co.uk/telectroscope/home.php
Gallery
In partnership with
Additional funding
Vital statistics
Visitors
50,000 +
Days of continuous connection
25
Distance from London to NY
5585km
Website hits
2.2m
High speed, uncontended link from London – New York
1
Marriage proposals
4
Conferences held
1 – the Transatlantic Inter-Era Telectroscope Steampunk Conference
