National Science Week Lecture: Richard Gillespie

As part of National Science Week, 10-18 August 2013, Dr Richard Gillespie, Head of Humanties Department, Museum Victoria, will discuss his current research on the history of The Melbourne Observatory, one of Australia’s major scientific research institutions in the 19th century. The observatory was home of the Great Melbourne Telescope (1868), the second largest reflecting telescope in the world at the time, and the largest steerable telescope in the world for decades. Dr Gillespie is coordinating a project (a partnership between Museum Victoria, the Astronomical Society of Victoria and Royal Botanic Gardens, Melbourne) to restore the Great Melbourne Telescope and make it accessible for public and education use.

Simon Starling worked closely with Richard Gillespie at Museum Victoria, engaging the speculum mirror of The Great Melbourne Telescope to create a filmic installation In Speculum that poetically explores diverse histories, forms and technologies related to vision, perception, scientific endeavour and modernity, all of which are critical to Starling’s practice.

^{Image: Great Melbourne Telescope, South Yarra, Victoria, circa 1870. Melbourne Observatory Collection. Image courtesy of Museums Victoria}