The History of Projection Mapping: From Magic Lanterns and Phantasmagoria to Theme Parks and Nights at Cultural Properties

This autumn and winter, too, events overlaying images onto buildings are planned at castles, temples and shrines around Japan. Projection mapping, which overlays images matched to the shape of a building, is a new term, but the history of devices that astonish people by projecting images with light goes back at least to the 17th-century magic lantern. Using materials from museums, research institutions and organizers, this article traces the flow from the magic lantern and phantasmagoria, Japan’s nishiki-kage-e and France’s “sound and light,” through experiments in art, research and theme parks, to nights at cultural properties.

The magic lantern and phantasmagoria: Devices that project and move images with light

According to the Magic Lantern Society in the UK, a research association devoted to the magic lantern, the oldest known description of a device for projecting images appears in Giovanni de Fontana’s “Liber Instrumentorum” (around 1420). The Dutch physicist Christiaan Huygens (1629–1695) had a working magic lantern by November 1659 at the latest.

The society says the first person to use the term “laterna magica” was Thomas Walgensten, who demonstrated and sold magic lanterns across Europe, while Athanasius Kircher, who wrote “Ars Magna Lucis et Umbrae” in 1646, is often mistakenly thought to be its inventor. Projecting an image requires four things: a light source, an object to project, a device to form the image and a screen.

In the late 18th century, showmen appeared who turned the magic lantern into a spectacle of the macabre: the phantasmagoria. According to collection notes from the Museu del Cinema in Girona, Spain, E.G. Robertson’s (1763–1837) first phantasmagoria was held in Paris in 1798 and was a great success. Its conceit was to summon up the spirits of the dead, monsters and ghosts, and other showmen soon imitated it.

According to the museum’s materials, Robertson placed the projector behind a translucent screen, hiding the apparatus from the audience. He mounted the lantern on a wheeled stand and moved it toward or away from the screen, making images appear to approach or recede. His improved lantern was patented in 1799 as the “Fantascope.” He also projected images onto smoke.

Changes in the image were created by manipulating brightness and size. The lantern began near the screen as a small, blurred light, and as it moved back with its aperture opened, the image grew larger, sharper and brighter. To muffle the sound, the stand’s wheels were wrapped in rubber or cloth. Robertson’s methods spread across Europe and the United States from the early 1800s, but as audiences learned how the tricks worked, they declined from the 1820s (museum materials).

Japan’s magic lantern “nishiki-kage-e”: Projecting from behind onto washi screens

The magic lantern also reached Japan. According to an explanation of Osaka City’s cultural properties, magic lanterns came to Japan in the late Edo period and gained popularity into the Meiji era. In the shows known in Osaka as “nishiki-kage-e,” wooden lanterns called “furo” and slides called “taneita,” the equivalent of film, were used to project moving images from behind onto washi paper screens.

A furo was focused by sliding a box containing the lens in and out, with a light placed inside the body. A taneita was a long, narrow board with square windows fitted with painted glass, and several were swapped quickly to create movement. Changing the distance from the screen or the projection position also transformed the image.

In Osaka, shows were held in amusement districts such as Nipponbashi from the late Edo period through the Meiji era. The last to survive was “Ayame-kan,” in the grounds of Goryo Shrine. There were more than 40 programs, centered on stories from rakugo, along with sword fights and ghost stories. From the late Taisho era, as motion pictures spread, the shows declined rapidly. The Osaka Museum of History holds one furo and 820 taneita, which Osaka City describes as one of the largest collections in Japan.

In Tokyo, the Edo-Tokyo Museum holds “utsushi-e taneita” (Meiji to early Showa) handed down in the Harashima family, who ran an inn in Hakonegasaki, Mizuho Town, Nishitama District. According to the museum, the former owner’s father showed magic lantern images to guests while chanting gidayu. It suggests an entertainment that combined narration and music with images of light.

Buildings become the stage: The 1952 “sound and light” and Lyon’s Festival of Lights

The format of making a historic building itself the stage for light staging was born in mid-20th-century France. According to “Les premiers ‘son et lumière’,” a 1990 research report published in the digital library of ENSSIB, a French higher education institution for library science, “son et lumière” (sound and light) premiered at the Château de Chambord on May 30, 1952, in the presence of President Vincent Auriol.

The report credits its conception to Paul-Robert Houdin, an architect responsible for preserving Chambord and other buildings in the Loire region. He is said to have been inspired in 1950 on seeing the château’s facade lit by lightning, though the report also notes that this was disputed. The performance used backlighting, oblique light, light from the sides and front, varying intensity, and white and colored light, all operated from a lighting console in time with narration, music and sound effects.

According to the report, by 1960 about 60 “sound and light” shows had been created in France and about 10 abroad, with examples abroad including Rome, the Acropolis and the pyramids of Egypt. The 14 million francs spent on the 1952 Chambord production was planned to be recouped in three years but was recovered in three months.

There are also events that color an entire city with light. According to the official website of the “Fête des Lumières” (Festival of Lights) in Lyon, France, its origins go back to December 8, 1852. When an official ceremony celebrating the installation of a statue of the Virgin Mary on Fourvière hill was canceled because of bad weather, residents spontaneously lit candles on their windowsills and balconies.

In 1989, Lyon adopted its first “Plan Lumière” (lighting plan) as an advanced public lighting policy. The festival is now held over four nights, and the official website says the city’s beautiful buildings become stages for large-scale “sound and light” installations. In 2026, it runs from Saturday, December 5 to Tuesday, December 8.

Into museums, laboratories and theme parks: Overlaying images onto the shapes of objects

Experiments in art and research extended the targets of projection to rooms and objects themselves. According to the official website of the American filmmaker Michael Naimark, his work “Displacements” was made three times between 1980 and 1984. A typical American living room was set up in a gallery, and two performers were filmed with a 16mm camera on a slowly rotating turntable in the center.

After filming, the camera was replaced with a film-loop projector, and the room’s furniture and walls were spray-painted white so the footage could be projected back onto them. The projected living room took on a strong three-dimensional quality, while the unpainted performers looked like ghosts. The third version was made at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 1984.

On the research side, Ramesh Raskar and colleagues presented the paper “Shader Lamps” at the 2001 Eurographics Rendering Workshop. The method measures three-dimensional shapes, such as white-painted models, and shines light calculated to fit the shape, giving them color and texture. How shapes are measured and aligned is covered in detail in our explainer on how projection mapping works.

At theme parks, technology used in parts of attractions became the star of nighttime shows. On May 29, 2014, Tokyo Disneyland launched “Once Upon a Time,” a castle projection show projecting images onto Cinderella Castle. According to a Tokyo Disney Resort press release (October 2013), it was the first time the resort had incorporated projection mapping into an entertainment program, with a running time of about 15 minutes and a total investment of about ¥2 billion (planned).

Before the launch, in April 2014, test footage projected onto a 1.5 m-tall model of Cinderella Castle (about 1/30 scale) was also released. The show combined the images with special effects such as lasers, searchlights and small fireworks.

The spread in Japan: From an elementary school building to a National Treasure keep

How projection onto architecture spread in Japan can be traced through the accounts of those involved. In an explanation in the academic journal “Kogaku” (Japanese Journal of Optics, 2014), Michiyuki Ishita of the Projection Mapping Association of Japan writes that efforts toward architectural projection mapping in Japan began around 2007, and that it was first realized in summer 2010, at a show at an elementary school in Zushi, Kanagawa Prefecture.

The event using the Zushi school building became an international competition in its third year, 2012. Creators competed with short works of 1 minute to 1 minute 59 seconds, and about one-third of the entries came from abroad. At the end of 2013, in front of Kashiwa Station in Chiba Prefecture, images were projected onto the 68 m-high wall of a department store using eight Christie projectors: two 35,000-lumen units and six 20,000-lumen units.

In September 2012, “TOKYO STATION VISION” was held to commemorate the completion of the preservation and restoration of the Marunouchi Building of Tokyo Station. In February 2024, permanent screenings began on the Tokyo Metropolitan Government No. 1 Building. The developments up to this point are also introduced in our explainer on projection mapping. What stands out in recent years are events staged on nights at cultural properties such as castles, temples and shrines.

In Nagano Prefecture, the “National Treasure Matsumoto Castle Keep Projection Mapping” continues as a winter event. The 2024–2025 edition combined projection mapping and laser mapping on the keep, and an October 2025 announcement put attendance at more than 170,000. The 2025–2026 edition took as motifs nishiki-e prints, folding-screen paintings and other works in the collection of the Matsumoto City Museum.

Among temples, in November 2024, a “Digital Art Night” projecting onto the National Treasure Miedo and Nyoraido halls was held at Takada Honzan Senju-ji in Tsu, Mie Prefecture. On the Miedo, about 42 m wide and 25 m high, images based on the designs of the temple’s cultural properties were combined with laser mapping, and about 13,000 people visited over three days (organizers’ figure). At Tsuruga-jo Castle in Aizuwakamatsu, projection mapping was held in 2025 for the first time in six years to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the keep’s reconstruction.

Those involved are also diverse. teamLab turns the stone walls and steps of the Fukuoka Castle ruins into works of light, and NAKED stages projection mapping on historic buildings at Nijo Castle along with light, sound and scent. The considerations and public guidelines for light staging at cultural properties are set out in our article on projection mapping on cultural properties and the care it requires.

Editor’s perspective

Laying out the flow since the 17th century reveals shared techniques. One is hiding the apparatus: the phantasmagoria hid the lantern behind a screen, and nishiki-kage-e also projected from behind onto washi screens. Another is combining image, space and sound: son et lumière matched light to narration and music, and Naimark overlaid footage onto a room itself.

Now that technology has advanced, nighttime events at cultural properties are also being asked how to convey the history of the place. Matsumoto Castle’s choice of the local museum’s nishiki-e and Senju-ji’s choice of the designs of the temple’s cultural properties as subject matter are one answer. Just as nishiki-kage-e was an entertainment combined with narration, how to tie the astonishment of light to a story is a challenge that has not changed, then or now.

Frequently asked questions

How do magic lanterns differ from cinema?

The magic lantern is a device that projects pictures painted on glass and the like with light. Movement was created by swapping slides or moving the projector (Osaka City’s explanation; materials from the Museu del Cinema in Girona). The Magic Lantern Society says that even after the Lumière brothers’ first public screening on December 28, 1895, the magic lantern did not disappear immediately, and some operators continued until after World War II.

Are son et lumière and projection mapping the same?

Son et lumière, which began in 1952, was a format that staged buildings with lighting and sound (research report published by ENSSIB). Michiyuki Ishita describes “mapping” as positioning and overlaying CG images and graphics designed to fit the projection target at the time of projection. The difference lies in using images made to fit the shape of a building.

*Information as of October 21, 2026. Please check the official websites for the latest information.

*Top image: Frontispiece of volume 1 (1831) of E.G. Robertson’s memoir “Mémoires récréatifs, scientifiques et anecdotiques,” depicting a phantasmagoria at the Cour des Capucines in Paris (public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

*This article was compiled by the TOKYO ART SPHERE editorial team based on official announcements by each organizer and facility and public materials from museums and research institutions (as of October 21, 2026).

Text: TOKYO ART SPHERE Editorial Team

A note from the publisher

*Disclosure: Among the events introduced in this article, the projection mapping at Matsumoto Castle (jointly with Epson Sales Japan and Seiko Epson), Takada Honzan Senju-ji, Tsuruga-jo Castle and Senso-ji (ASAKUSA CULTURE & LIGHTS) is produced or created by HITOHATA, INC., an affiliate of HITOHATA ASSOCIATION, the general incorporated association that operates TOKYO ART SPHERE (About us).

This autumn and winter, Senso-ji’s “ASAKUSA CULTURE & LIGHTS 2026” is held from Friday, October 30 to Tuesday, November 3 (national holiday), 18:00–21:30, and “Tsuruga-jo Castle Projection Mapping 2026” from Friday, November 20 to Sunday, November 22, 17:30–21:00. Both offer free viewing with no advance registration required (organizers’ announcements). The Senso-ji event is introduced in our article on the Senso-ji projection mapping.