Panoramas, Dioramas, Arcades: Water Worlds

.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ad/Passage_des_Panoramas.JPG/743px-Passage_des_Panoramas.JPG

Passage des Panoramas, Paris (built 1799)
: photo by Remi Jouan, November 2006




Trade and traffic are two components of the street. Now, in the arcades the second of these has effectively died out: the traffic there is rudimentary. The arcade is a street of lascivious commerce only; it is wholly adapted to arousing desires. Because in this street the juices slow to a standstill, the commodity proliferates along the margins and enters into fantastic combinations, like the tissue in tumours.

Walter Benjamin, Das Passagen-Werk / The Arcades Project, 1927-1940, ed. Rolf Tiedeman, 1982, trans. Howard Eiland & Kevin McLaughlin, 1999: Convolute A: Arcades, Magasins de Nouveautés, Sales Clerks





Passage des Panoramas, Paris
(built 1799): photographic panorama by
∃Scape (Pascal), 9 April 2011



Hotel Chopin, Passage des Panoramas, Paris
: photo by
SylvieLeBars, 3 June 2009



Don't make me forget: Passage des Panoramas, Paris: photo by bEbOpix, 4 December 2009



One knew of places in ancient Greece where the way led down into the underworld. Our waking existence is a land which, at certain hidden points, leads down into the underworld -- a land full of inconspicuous places from which dreams arise. All day long, suspecting nothing, we pass them by, but no sooner has sleep come than we are eagerly groping our way back to lose ourselves in those dark corridors.

Walter Benjamin, Das Passagen-Werk / The Arcades Project, 1927-1940, ed. Rolf Tiedeman, 1982, trans. Howard Eiland & Kevin McLaughlin, 1999: Convolute C: Ancient Paris, Catacombs, Demolitions, Decline of Paris




http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f2/West_eMall.jpg/1024px-West_eMall.jpg

The Sea Life caverns at West Edmonton Mall, Alberta (largest shopping mall in North America, built 1981)
: photo by Longdistancer, 3 April 2010


The innermost glowing cells of the city of light, the old dioramas nested in the arcades, one of which still bears the name Passage des Panoramas. It was, in the first moment, as though you had entered an aquarium. Along the wall of the great darkened hall, broken at intervals by narrow joints, it stretched like a ribbon of illuminated water behind glass. The play of colors among deep-sea finery cannot be more fiery.

Walter Benjamin, Das Passagen-Werk / The Arcades Project, 1927-1940, ed. Rolf Tiedeman, 1982, trans. Howard Eiland & Kevin McLaughlin, 1999: Convolute Q: Panorama




http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/The_World_Waterpark_-_Edmonton.jpg/1024px-The_World_Waterpark_-_Edmonton.jpg

Blue Thunder Wave Pool (world's largest indoor wave pool) at World Water Park (world's largest water park, built 1985), West Edmonton Mall: photo by Lake Nipissing, 17 May 2006

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1b/Wwp-06.jpg/1024px-Wwp-06.jpg

Maze of waterslides (Howler, Twister and old chute of the Blue Bullet) at World Water Park, West Edmonton Mall: photo by Rootology, 24 May 2008

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/87/Wwp-08.jpg/1024px-Wwp-08.jpg

Waterslides (Nessie's Revenge [purple] and the original Sky Screamer [red]; also visible, Tropical Typhoon [the blue slide] and the Corkscrew [the green slide behind Nessie's Revenge]
) at World Water Park, West Edmonton Mall: photo by Rootology, 24 May 2008

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f9/Wwp-03.jpg/1024px-Wwp-03.jpg

Enclosed and open waterslides at World Water Park, West Edmonton Mall: photo by Rootology, 24 May 2008

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/40/Wwp-05.jpg/1024px-Wwp-05.jpg

Thunderbolt and sled slide at World Water Park, West Edmonton Mall: photo by Rootology, 24 May 2008

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e9/WEM-Waterpark-slides.JPG/1024px-WEM-Waterpark-slides.JPG

Slides at World Water Park, West Edmonton Mall: photo by Qyd, October 2006

No comments:

Post a Comment