Architecture Commons^™

Surveillance, Spectacle, Michael Ma

Architecture Senior Theses

Perhaps the most scripted way of seeing is fully characterized by the field of cinema. The development of film grows out of moving images where experimentations with illustrations and multiple freeze frame photographs can be traced back to Eadward Muybridge, E.J. Marey, and Thomas Edison. Through the development of tropes and scopes, optical illusions are created and the eyes begin to see motion images. Cinema, a spectacular event, owes its origins to the evolution of these devices and photography. The other variation of these devices of spectacle are surveillance tools. These devices transform the audience from mere spectators to observers …