The Tunnel Calamity
Paper Peepshow
1984 (published)
1984 (published)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Although the title of this work is The Tunnel Calamity, the scene unfolding in the tunnel is strangely devoid of any sense of chaos or terror. A large furry animal with fearful eyes calmly roams the busy tunnel, yet no one sees him, apart from a diminutive child pausing to watch him walk by. Only the little boy has the ability to witness the ‘[u]nexpected appearance of the ULUUS (thought to have been extinct for over a century) in the tunnel connecting East Shoetree and West Radish. St Frumble’s Day, 1892’.
The creator of this work, Edward Gorey (1925-2000), was a twentieth-century American writer and artist best known for his illustrated books. With its melancholy atmosphere and figures dressed in attire typical of the late Victorian period, this paper peepshow shows many of Gorey’s works’ instantly recognisable features. It also clearly refers back to its most famous predecessor, the nineteenth-century Thames Tunnel paper peepshow, well represented in the V&A’s Gestetner collection (see Gestetner 195 in references for a typical example).
The creator of this work, Edward Gorey (1925-2000), was a twentieth-century American writer and artist best known for his illustrated books. With its melancholy atmosphere and figures dressed in attire typical of the late Victorian period, this paper peepshow shows many of Gorey’s works’ instantly recognisable features. It also clearly refers back to its most famous predecessor, the nineteenth-century Thames Tunnel paper peepshow, well represented in the V&A’s Gestetner collection (see Gestetner 195 in references for a typical example).
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Title | The Tunnel Calamity (published title) |
| Materials and techniques | |
| Brief description | The Tunnel Calamity, Gorey, Edward, 1984 |
| Physical description | Accordion-style paper peepshow of a beast in a fictional city tunnel. 8 cut-out panels. 1 peep-hole. Offset lithography. Expands to approximately 60 cm. Front-face: Against the brick background, the title and the artist’s name on the top. A door in an arch in the middle, a man on a bicycle with a boy on the handlebars on the left, and a couple pushing a baby in a pram on the right. The peep-hole consists of a circular opening with a Perspex lens above the door. Panels 1-4 and 6-8: pedestrians, including men, women and children, in the tunnel. The tunnel archway is decorated with a snake tied in knots at the top and flanked by columns. Statues of women in different gestures on top of the columns. The boy on the front-face, panel 2, 4, and 8, is the other protagonist in the story. Panel 5: a large and strange-looking animal (the Uluus) in the tunnel. Back panel: two men and a woman at the end of the tunnel, which has a wooden door in an arch and a circular looking glass above, within which there sits a figure. One man looks at the plaque to the right of the door. |
| Dimensions |
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| Credit line | Accepted under the Cultural Gifts Scheme by HM Government from the collections of Jacqueline and Jonathan Gestetner and allocated to the Victoria and Albert Museum, 2016. |
| Object history | Part of the Jacqueline and Jonathan Gestetner Collection, collected over 30 years and given to the V&A Museum through the government's Cultural Gift Scheme, 2016. |
| Summary | Although the title of this work is The Tunnel Calamity, the scene unfolding in the tunnel is strangely devoid of any sense of chaos or terror. A large furry animal with fearful eyes calmly roams the busy tunnel, yet no one sees him, apart from a diminutive child pausing to watch him walk by. Only the little boy has the ability to witness the ‘[u]nexpected appearance of the ULUUS (thought to have been extinct for over a century) in the tunnel connecting East Shoetree and West Radish. St Frumble’s Day, 1892’. The creator of this work, Edward Gorey (1925-2000), was a twentieth-century American writer and artist best known for his illustrated books. With its melancholy atmosphere and figures dressed in attire typical of the late Victorian period, this paper peepshow shows many of Gorey’s works’ instantly recognisable features. It also clearly refers back to its most famous predecessor, the nineteenth-century Thames Tunnel paper peepshow, well represented in the V&A’s Gestetner collection (see Gestetner 195 in references for a typical example). |
| Bibliographic references |
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| Other number | 38041016058836 - NAL barcode |
| Collection | |
| Library number | Gestetner 332 |
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| Record created | July 31, 2019 |
| Record URL |
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