TRUCHET, A. - La Lune à un Mètre (Mini poster for Paris Exposition Universelle)

Original lithograph poster for "Paris Exposition Universelle" held between April and November, 1900, which received 50 million visitors.

In 1899, director Georges Méliès created one of the most recognizable films in the history of early cinema, "La lune à un mètre" (1898), more famously known by its alternative title Le rêve d'un astronome (The Astronomer's dream). One year later, the "Exposition Universelle" in Paris presented patrons with the opportunity to view the moon through a large telescope.
The spectacle is beautifully depicted on this original mini poster, featuring a magnificent image of a smiling moon that was no doubt inspired by Méliès' landmark film.
Artist Louis Abel Truchet created an image familiar to many, making the attraction one of the exposition's more popular.

A powerful telescope known as "La grande lunette". Constructed specifically for the exhibition by Paul Gautier, the telescope was the centerpiece of the Palais d'Optique, and was advertised under the rubrique La lune à un mètre (The moon from a distance of one metre). With the aid of this telescope, views of the moon's surface were displayed on a giant screen. These images were produced by the astronomers Maurice Loewy and Pierre Henri Puiseux as a series of large photographs which were printed for the public in stereoscopic and carte de visite format.
La grande lunette was the world's largest refracting telescope.