The Grand Telectroscope

Over the long holiday weekend, my boyfriend and I went out to Brooklyn to see this interesting art exhibit called the Telectroscope. Multimedia artist and sculptor Paul St. George created an art installation that links London to New York City. In each city there is a steampunk-esque telescope device that protrudes from the ground, allowing visitors to look down into it’s lens. There they will see the city, and people who are standing in front of it in the other city, via a HD camera and broadband setup.

St. George also concocted an interesting fictional back story for the exhibit where he says that this project was based off of the plans of his great-grandfather Alexander Stanhope St. George, who was said to be an eccentric Victorian engineer. Alexander is said to have come up with these plans after tunnels were found on a mid-Atlantic island that were dug to entomb French prisoners of War, or to aid escaping slaves. Paul says that he found these plans and decided to follow through on his great-grandfather's.

The telectroscope in NYC resides on a pier under the Brooklyn Bridge on the Brooklyn side. It looks as if it was pushed up onto the dock, complete with rocks and wood planks surrounding the base of the scope. At the front there is an area for people to stand (or queue for the Brits) to get their chance to look out at London. New Yorkers get to see the Tower Bridge in the background, and Londoners get to see the Brooklyn Bridge. It’s very fun to look down this long tube and see people smiling and waving back at you in real time. My boyfriend got a kick out of writing on a white board “Manchester United #1” and finding out that one gentleman on the other side is not a fan.

I was able to get some photos of the Londoners (who may or may not have been posing), and what looks like fireworks in the background. Once I have them uploaded I’ll post them here for debate. Was there some holiday yesterday in the UK that would be cause for fireworks?

This has been my favorite exhibit of the summer so far!

Top picture courtesy Stephanie Summers; Bottom picture from Wikipedia