'Panoramic visions': Denise Blake Oleksijczuk, The First Panoramas; Erkki Huhtamo, Illusions in Motion

This essay reviews two recent publications—Denise Blake Oleksijczuk’s The First Panoramas and Erkki Huhtamo’s Illusions in Motion—which deal with the rich visual and cultural history of panoramas. The essay assesses the respective contributions of these books to the history of this phenomenon. Beginning with Robert Barker’s panoramic paintings of Edinburgh and London, which were displayed on a cylindrical surface in London in 1792, panoramas offered a remarkable visual experience for spectators. This essay reflects on the popularity of this phenomenon, and the ways in which the history and impact of panoramas is discussed and interpreted in the work of Oleksijczuk and Huhtamo