Light Painting History Has Changed, Sorry Frank

That’s right boys and girls thanks to a find from the great Vicki DaSilva the history of light painting has changed. Sorry Frank Gilbreth but you are no longer the man that created the first light painting images, that title now goes to Étienne-Jules Marey and Georges Demeny who’s work preceded Gilbrith’s by as much as 25 years. The two first met when Demeny enrolled in a physiology course being taught by Marey. They soon became close associates. Together Marey and Demeny established a programme of research, which was to lead to the creation of the ‘Station Physiologique’, which opened in 1882 in the Bois de Boulogne. They developed several photographic techniques to study the movements of everything from humans to horses. In 1889 Demeny attached incandescent bulbs to the joints of an assistant and created what is the first known light painting photograph “Pathological Walk From In Front”. More to come soon……