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Angebot nach Ausstellung

Temporary Exhibition "Mirror, mirror"



Mirrors are amongst the most familiar objects of our everyday routine: they're in the bathroom, waiting for us in the morning, they help us when driving and they reflect the visible light in lamps and illuminations.

This special exhibition includes mirrors in all shapes and forms, as well as a composite "Matrix Mirror" that will produce strange distortions in your reflection and a non-stop series of surprising "wow!" effects. The confusing symmetries, asymmetries, the apparent left-right-but-not-up-down interchange quickly surpass the limits of human imagination, leaving you surprised and astonished!

Mirror games are often very simple – and yet so perplexing: at the Hinged Kaleidoscope, Polytakis and the many Kaleidoscopes, you can create the most beautiful figures and try out the strangest things.

We are particularly proud of the Cube to infinity, in which you find yourself in what seems to be a giant hall – with thousands of images of yourself. Expect a similar experience at the Dual Mirror, where you look into 55 reflections, but never see your neighbour.
Exhibit-Links
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2x2 Puzzle

Four cubes fit together in the box. Each cube has 4 quarter-pictures, one on each of 4 faces. The other two faces are transparent, BUT they look onto the…

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Air Mirror

Sit comfortably and check the stripy view at the end of the road. Now heat up the road. (A solid steel plate rapidly heats to 100°, warming the dark sand of…

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Anamorphic Images: Cone

On a flat surface the images are distorted beyond recognition – a peculiar visual code requiring a special key. Slip the square sheets over the reflective…

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Anamorphic Images: Cylinder

On a flat surface, the images are distorted beyond recognition - a special visual code needs a special key. Put the square panels over the reflective cylinder:…

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Back View

Step forward to check how neat (or not….) your bum really looks in those cool new jeans: every clothes’ store should have this back-view booth!

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Bathroom Mirror

Sit quietly in front of the mirror and look closely at your face: sketch the outline, mouth, nose and eyes as you see them in the mirror. Now look at your…

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Carousel of Faces

As you carefully adjust the light level, the mirror becomes a window onto a well-known face. Balance illumination with reflection, and merge your face with a…

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Cold and Warm Light Mirrors

Without protection, the lamp in a slide projector would melt the valuable slide. How can you protect the slides? This exhibit shows the effect of different…

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Colour Corner

Set two mirrors at 62°, cap them with a third, and mount a lightbox at their apex. This kaleidoscopic art piece is another Caspar Schwabe creation: “2%…

Würfel im Spiegel

Cube in a Mirror

Move this wire-skeleton cube towards and away from the mirror: when does its mirror image appear biggest?

Unendlichkeitswürfel Foto

Cube to Infinity

This cube is as big as a garden hut, mirrored inside, with its corners cut out so kids can crawl in and tall people can see what’s happening inside. What’s…

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Cubes cubed

Pull on the cord to create a translucent cube. Keep on pulling to make it grow. Inside the kaleidoscope, it expands backwards as well as forwards so it grows…

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Deformable Mirror

Here is whole-body morphing at the touch of a switch in a mirror the size of a door. Curvature is controlled at 15 points, offering wild effects from ‘Diagonal…

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Dual Mirror I

by James Seawright This work consists of 110 mirror tiles arranged into two concave surfaces. The radii of the concavities are the same, but the mirrors are…

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Elusive Mirror

Look into the magic mirror. Can you outsmart it?

Experimentierecke

Experimental Stations 1 to 6

On a hexagonal table is a circus of hands-on activities, all to do with reflections in every-day life: What’s in a surface? Reflections off curved…

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Eyes in the Back of your Head

With this device you can see the skills of your hairdresser: How sharp is the cut around her neck? Are you happy with the fit of their collar? Are you starting…

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Fresnel Mirror

by Dave Barker A mirror that spreads out your face so that you can almost look into your ears! Stand on the red dot, look into the mirror exactly in the…

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Hands-on Mirage

The laser beam brushing the surface of the hot plate is visible until you blow down through the hole. Your relatively cool breath above the hot plate makes a…

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Hinged Kaleidoscope

Slowly close the hinged door, and count the number of regular polygons traced by the red cord: triangle, square, pentagon, hexagon,... Just before the door…

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It's About Time

by Bill Spinhoven In this installation, a video camera captures visitors' position and movements, temporarily stores the data, and then projects the sequences…

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Jellyfish

by Bernd Weinmayer A group of glass jellyfish - glassblowing art of the highest order - filled with colourful glowing neon and a few promillen of argon -…

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Kaleidoscope Experiments 1 to 6

Oversized toy or mathematical puzzle? Six kaleidoscopes invite experimentation and reward with crystalline 3-D images. Each kaleidoscope is equipped with a…

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Kopflos

In this exhibit, you can look at yourself in the mirror - but you can adjust the different stripes of the mirror.Maybe you can even manage to lose your head?

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Mega-Kaleidoscope

Duck down and step into the man-sized kaleidoscope: three huge mirrors set in a triangle. Ask a friend to look through the spy-hole, to see you at the centre…

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Mirror Made to Measure

How tall a mirror do you need to see yourself from head to toe? Does the height change if you’re closer or further away? (No!) Using the remote control, you…

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Mirror Maze

Design a maze with Einstein’s image as it’s goal. At your disposal are five mirrors, many wall pieces, and your trial-and-error learning of the laws of…

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Mirror Writing 1

Handedness of letters: Most letters of the Roman alphabet are asymmetrical both horizontally and vertically. But C, D and E look the same upside down, though…

Spiegelschriften2 Foto

Mirror Writing 2

Use the magnetic letters to create words and sentences that can also be read normally in the mirror. You can also slide the boards under the mirror - in doing…

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Nothing but air

With a dark field illumination (schlieren optics), the smallest changes in air density (refractive index) are made visible. The apparatus is so large that the…

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Parallel Mirrors

If you look between the pair of parallel mirrors, you see repeating images stretching from left to right. With perfect retro-reflection, this would go on…

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Pepper’s Ghost

This is one of the oldest special effects, 100 years older than Star Wars and Spiderman. A large piece of glass tilted towards the viewer visually combines a…

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Plato’s Playground

by Don Doak A reflection of the reflection of the reflection... - makes a kaleidoscope! The three mirrors in this tube are arranged in such a way that a…

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Polytakis

by Caspar Schwabe Created by Zurich mathematician/artist Caspar Schwabe, Polytakis is designed to provoke kaleidoscope aficionados and quizzical visitors…

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Radar Reflector

When light strikes a rough surface it is reflected all over the place. Now polish that surface to cut out all the diffuse radiation, and you get a mirror off…

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Rotating Mirrors

No mysteries with the flat 180° mirror: rotate it and your image stays straight in front of you. The two mirrors joined at a 90° corner give you the…

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S-bend Mirror

Lying and standing. Some fairground mirrors make you very small, others very large. Our mirrors do both! Make yourself small, tall, thick, thin and even…

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Shake Hands with Yourself

The concave mirror is shiny black: a red ball dangles invitingly, brightly lit. Set the ball swinging, then slowly reach to catch it. Your mirror-image hand…

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Shiny Metal Sphere

Here is the fish-eye effect: the centre of the image looks correct but round the edge, where light strikes the sphere’s surface at an oblique angle, it gets…

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Thermal image

The "temperature-sensitive" mirror image - A thermal imaging camera registers its heat radiation and converts this information into an image: cold areas are…

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Your Father's Nose...

Share your face with someone else! Between the mirror strips you can look at the other person's face so that you can alternately "see" your own eyes, a foreign…

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Zoom Mirror

by Christian Megert This mirror is flexible. It changes its shape from convex to concave and vice versa. Seen from a distance, your mirror image is upright and…