Intervention : Fleur Hopkins-Loféron

A little-known french genre called the merveilleux-scientifique took great interest at the turn of the century for seeing the invisible. Microbes, auras, thoughts, aliens, waves embodied this scopic urge for the invisible. One recurrent theme is becoming partly or entirely invisible, using science and not Prince Lutin’s magical hat, or Gygès’ ring. This talk wants to investigate the trope of becoming in many ways invisible (chameleon man, fog man, transparent and translucent man, living head without a body, a man made of auras) in the genre. We will be showing the impact contemporary sciences (spectrology, X-Rays, camouflage and studies on mimicry, disruptive figures), pseudo-sciences (theosophy, N-Rays, occulture) and prestidigitation (vanishing woman) had on the imagination of the time. We will also study the visual culture of the invisible man: is he depicted by his clothes, is he made of dots, or just a ghostly opaque figure? Visual Studies will come in hand to help us study, precisely, what can not be seen.

Updated on 02/07/2018