The Ghent scientist Joseph Plateau is worldwide known as the first person to produce moving images in the phenakistiscope. Therefore he is meant to be the precursor of the cinema. This achievement was the result of his experiments in the field of the persistence of light impressions on the retina. But Plateau was far more than that: he was a versatile physicist, with an inquisitive mind, who studied fundamental problems in physics and mathematics.
Before he went blind, he conducted all his experiences himself and described them in great detail. Most of his original apparatus, built and used for his experiments, have been conserved in the Physics Laboratory of the University of Ghent, of which he was the founder and first director. The collection is now in the Museum for the History of Sciences of the University of Ghent.
The exhibition in the Sint-Pieters abbey shows several aspects of the scientific work of Plateau, the moving image experiments but also the experiments in the field of surface tension and stability of liquids, capillarity, and even the "physique" amusante" which was very popular at the end of the 19th century. The exhibition at the Sint-Pieters abbey is open to the public every day from 10am till 5pm, between September 22nd and October 15th (except on Mondays).