Gaslamp Fantasy

Steampunk is a subgenre of science fiction that incorporates retrofuturistic technology and aesthetics inspired by, but not limited to, 19th-century industrial steam-powered machinery. Steampunk works are often set in an alternative history of the Victorian era or the American frontier, where steam power remains in mainstream use, or in a fantasy world that similarly employs steam power.

Steampunk features anachronistic technologies or retrofuturistic inventions as people in the 19th century might have envisioned them — distinguishing it from Neo-Victorianism — and is likewise rooted in the era's perspective on fashion, culture, architectural style, and art. Such technologies may include fictional machines like those found in the works of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne. Other examples of steampunk contain alternative-history-style presentations of such technology as steam cannons, lighter-than-air airships, analog computers, or such digital mechanical computers as Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine.

Steampunk may also incorporate additional elements from the genres of fantasy, horror, historical fiction, alternate history, or other branches of speculative fiction, making it often a hybrid genre. As a form of speculative fiction, it explores alternative futures or pasts but can also address real-world social issues. The first known appearance of the term ''steampunk'' was in 1987, though it now retroactively refers to many works of fiction created as far back as the 1950s or earlier. A popular subgenre is Japanese steampunk, consisting of steampunk-themed manga and anime.

Steampunk also refers to any of the artistic styles, clothing fashions, or subcultures that have developed from the aesthetics of steampunk fiction, Victorian-era fiction, art nouveau design, and films from the mid-20th century. Various modern utilitarian objects have been modded by individual artisans into a pseudo-Victorian mechanical "steampunk" style, and a number of visual and musical artists have been described as steampunk.

History

Precursors

Steampunk is influenced by and often adopts the style of the 19th-century scientific romances of Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, Mary Shelley, and Edward S. Ellis's '' The Steam Man of the Prairies''. Several more modern works of art and fiction significant to the development of the genre were produced before the genre had a name. '' Titus Alone'' (1959), by Mervyn Peake, is widely regarded by scholars as the first novel in the genre proper, while others point to Michael Moorcock's 1971 novel '' The Warlord of the Air'', which was heavily influenced by Peake's work. The film ''Brazil'' (1985) was an early cinematic influence, although it can also be considered a precursor to the steampunk offshoot dieselpunk. '' The Adventures of Luther Arkwright'' was an early (1970s) comic version of the Moorcock-style mover between timestreams.

In fine art, Remedios Varo's paintings combine elements of Victorian dress, fantasy, and technofantasy imagery. In television, one of the earliest manifestations of the steampunk ethos in the mainstream media was the CBS television series ''The Wild Wild West'' (1965–69), which inspired the later film.

Origin of the term

Although many works now considered seminal to the genre were published in the 1960s and 1970s, the term "steampunk" originated largely in the 1980s as a tongue-in-cheek variant of "cyberpunk". It was coined by science fiction author K. W. Jeter, who was trying to find a general term for works by Tim Powers ('' The Anubis Gates'', 1983), James Blaylock (''Homunculus'', 1986), and himself ('' Morlock Night'', 1979, and '' Infernal Devices'', 1987) — all of which took place in a 19th-century (usually Victorian) setting and imitated conventions of such actual Victorian speculative fiction as H. G. Wells' ''The Time Machine''. In a letter to science fiction magazine '' Locus'', printed in the April 1987 issue, Jeter wrote:

Modern steampunk

While Jeter's '' Morlock Night'' and '' Infernal Devices'', Powers' '' The Anubis Gates'', and Blaylock's '' Lord Kelvin's Machine'' were the first novels to which Jeter's neologism would be applied, the three authors gave the term little thought at the time. They were far from the first modern science fiction writers to speculate on the development of steam-based technology or alternative histories. Keith Laumer's '' Worlds of the Imperium'' (1962) and Ronald W. Clark's '' Queen Victoria's Bomb'' (1967) apply modern speculation to past-age technology and society. Michael Moorcock's '' Warlord of the Air'' (1971) is another early example. Harry Harrison's novel '' A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah!'' (1973) portrays Britain in an alternative 1973, full of atomic locomotives, coal-powered flying boats, ornate submarines, and Victorian dialogue. '' The Adventures of Luther Arkwright'' (mid-1970s) was one of the first steampunk comics. In February 1980, Richard A. Lupoff and Steve Stiles published the first "chapter" of their 10-part comic strip ''The Adventures of Professor Thintwhistle and His Incredible Aether Flyer''. In 2004, one anonymous author described steampunk as "Colonizing the Past so we can dream the future."

The first use of the word "steampunk" in a title was in Paul Di Filippo's 1995 ''Steampunk Trilogy'', consisting of three short novels: "Victoria", "Hottentots", and "Walt and Emily", which, respectively, imagine the replacement of Queen Victoria by a human/newt clone; an invasion of Massachusetts by Lovecraftian monsters, drawing its title from the historic racial taxonomy "hottentot"; and a love affair between Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson.

Japanese steampunk

Japanese steampunk consists of steampunk manga comics and anime productions from Japan. Steampunk elements have consistently appeared in mainstream manga since the 1940s, dating back to Osamu Tezuka's epic science-fiction trilogy consisting of ''Lost World'' (1948), ''Metropolis'' (1949) and '' Nextworld'' (1951). The steampunk elements found in manga eventually made their way into mainstream anime productions starting in the 1970s. Influenced by 19th-century European authors such as Jules Verne, steampunk anime and manga arose from a Japanese fascination with an imaginary fantastical version of old Industrial Europe, linked to a phenomenon called '' akogare no Pari'' ("the Paris of our dreams"), comparable to the West's fascination with an "exotic" East.

The most influential steampunk animator was Hayao Miyazaki, who was creating steampunk anime since the 1970s, starting with the television show '' Future Boy Conan'' (1978). His manga '' Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind'' (1982) and its 1984 anime film adaptation also contained steampunk elements. Miyazaki's most influential steampunk production was the Studio Ghibli anime film '' Laputa: Castle in the Sky'' (1986), which became a major milestone in the genre and has been described by ''The Steampunk Bible'' as "one of the first modern steampunk classics." Archetypal steampunk elements in ''Laputa'' include airships, air pirates, steam-powered robots, and a view of steam power as a limitless but potentially dangerous source of power.

The success of ''Laputa'' inspired Hideaki Anno and Studio Gainax to create their first hit production, '' Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water'' (1990), a steampunk anime show which loosely adapts elements from Verne's ''Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas'', with Captain Nemo making an appearance. Based on a concept by Miyazaki, ''Nadia'' was influential on later steampunk anime such as Katsuhiro Otomo's anime film ''Steamboy'' (2004). Disney's animated steampunk film '' Atlantis: The Lost Empire'' (2001) was influenced by anime, particularly Miyazaki's works and possibly ''Nadia''. Other popular Japanese steampunk works include Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli anime film '' Howl's Moving Castle'' (2004), Sega's video game and anime franchise '' Sakura Wars'' (1996) which is set in a steampunk version of Meiji/ Taishō era Japan, and Square Enix's manga and anime franchise ''Fullmetal Alchemist'' (2001).

Relationships to retrofuturism, DIY craft and making

Steampunk used to be confused with retrofuturism. Indeed, both sensibilities recall "the older but still modern eras in which technological change seemed to anticipate a better world, one remembered as relatively innocent of industrial decline." For some scholars, retrofuturism is considered a strand of steampunk, one that looks at alternatives to historical imagination and usually created with the same kinds of social protagonists and written for the same type of audiences.

One of steampunk's most significant contributions is the way in which it mixes digital media with traditional handmade art forms. As scholars Rachel Bowser and Brian Croxall put it, "the tinkering and tinker-able technologies within steampunk invite us to roll up our sleeves and get to work re-shaping our contemporary world." In this respect, steampunk bears much in common with DIY craft and bricolage artmaking.

Art, entertainment, and media

Art and design

Many of the visualisations of steampunk have their origins with, among others, Walt Disney's film ''20,000 Leagues Under the Sea'' (1954), including the design of the story's submarine the ''Nautilus'', its interiors, and the crew's underwater gear.

Aspects of steampunk design emphasise a balance between form and function. In this, it is like the Arts and Crafts Movement. But John Ruskin, William Morris, and the other reformers in the late nineteenth century rejected machines and industrial production. In contrast, steampunk enthusiasts present a "non-luddite critique of technology". In Dutch amusement park De Efteling, there is a dive coaster themed to a steampunk Victorian haunted goldmine called Baron 1898.

Various modern utilitarian objects have been modified by enthusiasts into a pseudo-Victorian mechanical "steampunk" style. Examples include computer keyboards and electric guitars. The goal of such redesigns is to employ appropriate materials (such as polished brass, iron, wood, and leather) with design elements and craftsmanship consistent with the Victorian era, rejecting the aesthetic of industrial design.

In 1994, the Paris Metro station at Arts et Métiers was redesigned by Belgian artist Francois Schuiten in steampunk style, to honor the works of Jules Verne. The station is reminiscent of a submarine, sheathed in brass with giant cogs in the ceiling and portholes that look out onto fanciful scenes.

The artist group ''Kinetic Steam Works'' brought a working steam engine to the Burning Man festival in 2006 and 2007. The group's founding member, Sean Orlando, created a Steampunk Tree House (in association with a group of people who would later form the ''Five Ton Crane Arts Group'') that has been displayed at a number of festivals. The Steampunk Tree House is now permanently installed at the Dogfish Head Brewery in Milton, Delaware.

The Neverwas Haul is a three-story, self-propelled mobile art vehicle built to resemble a Victorian house on wheels. Designed by Shannon O'Hare, it was built by volunteers in 2006 and presented at the Burning Man festival from 2006 through 2015. When fully built, the Haul propelled itself at a top speed of 5 miles per hour and required a crew of ten people to operate safely. Currently, the Neverwas Haul makes her home at Obtainium Works, an "art car factory" in Vallejo, CA owned by O'Hare and home to several other self-styled "contraptionists".

In May–June 2008, multimedia artist and sculptor Paul St George exhibited outdoor interactive video installations linking London and Brooklyn, New York, in a Victorian era-styled telectroscope. Utilizing this device, New York promoter Evelyn Kriete organised a transatlantic wave between steampunk enthusiasts from both cities, prior to White Mischief's '' Around the World in 80 Days'' steampunk-themed event.

In 2009, for Questacon, artist Tim Wetherell created a large wall piece that represented the concept of the clockwork universe. This steel artwork contains moving gears, a working clock, and a movie of the moon's terminator in action. The 3D moon movie was created by Antony Williams.

Steampunk became a common descriptor for homemade objects sold on the craft network Etsy between 2009 and 2011, though many of the objects and fashions bear little resemblance to earlier established descriptions of steampunk. Thus the craft network may not strike observers as "sufficiently steampunk" to warrant its use of the term. Comedian April Winchell, author of the book ''Regretsy: Where DIY Meets WTF'', cataloged some of the most egregious and humorous examples on her website "Regretsy". The blog was popular among steampunks and even inspired a music video that went viral in the community and was acclaimed by steampunk "notables".

From October 2009 through February 2010, the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford, hosted the first major exhibition of steampunk art objects, curated and developed by New York artist and designer Art Donovan, who also exhibited his own "electro-futuristic" lighting sculptures, and presented by Dr. Jim Bennett, museum director. From redesigned practical items to fantastical contraptions, this exhibition showcased the work of eighteen steampunk artists from around the globe. The exhibit proved to be the most successful and highly attended in the museum's history and attracted more than eighty thousand visitors. The event was detailed in the official artist's journal ''The Art of Steampunk'', by curator Donovan.

In November 2010, The Libratory Steampunk Art Gallery was opened by Damien McNamara in Oamaru, New Zealand. Created from papier-mâché to resemble a large cave and filled with industrial equipment from yesteryear, rayguns, and general steampunk quirks, its purpose is to provide a place for steampunkers in the region to display artwork for sale all year long. A year later, a more permanent gallery, Steampunk HQ, was opened in the former Meeks Grain Elevator Building across the road from The Woolstore, and has since become a notable tourist attraction for Oamaru.

Fashion

Steampunk fashion has no set guidelines but tends to synthesize modern styles with influences from the Victorian era. Such influences may include bustles, corsets, gowns, and petticoats; suits with waistcoats, coats, top hats and bowler hats (themselves originating in 1850 England), tailcoats and spats; or military-inspired garments. Steampunk-influenced outfits are usually accented with several technological and "period" accessories: timepieces, parasols, flying/driving goggles, and ray guns. Modern accessories like cell phones or music players can be found in steampunk outfits, after being modified to give them the appearance of Victorian-era objects. Post-apocalyptic elements, such as gas masks, ragged clothing, and tribal motifs, can also be included. Aspects of steampunk fashion have been anticipated by mainstream high fashion, the Lolita and aristocrat styles, neo-Victorianism, and the Romantic Goth subculture.

In 2005, Kate Lambert, known as "Kato", founded the first steampunk clothing company, "Steampunk Couture", mixing Victorian and post-apocalyptic influences. In 2013, IBM predicted, based on an analysis of more than a half million public posts on message boards, blogs, social media sites, and news sources, "that 'steampunk,' a subgenre inspired by the clothing, technology and social mores of Victorian society, will be a major trend to bubble up and take hold of the retail industry". Indeed, high fashion lines such as Prada, Dolce & Gabbana, Versace, Chanel, and Christian Dior had already been introducing steampunk styles on the fashion runways.

In episode 7 of Lifetime's '' Under the Gunn'' reality series, contestants were challenged to create avant-garde "steampunk chic" looks. ''America's Next Top Model'' tackled steampunk fashion in a 2012 episode where models competed in a steampunk-themed photo shoot, posing in front of a steam train while holding a live owl.

Literature

In 1988, the first version of the science fiction tabletop role-playing game '' Space: 1889'' was published. The game is set in an alternative history in which certain now discredited Victorian scientific theories were probable and led to new technologies. Contributing authors included Frank Chadwick, Loren Wiseman, and Marcus Rowland.

William Gibson and Bruce Sterling's novel '' The Difference Engine'' (1990) is often credited with bringing about widespread awareness of steampunk. The novel applies the principles of Gibson and Sterling's cyberpunk writings to an alternative Victorian era where Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage's proposed steam-powered mechanical computer, which Babbage called a difference engine (a later, more general-purpose version was known as an Analytical Engine), was actually built, and led to the dawn of the Information Age more than a century "ahead of schedule". This setting was different from most steampunk settings in that it takes a dim and dark view of this future, rather than the more prevalent utopian versions.

Nick Gevers's original anthology ''Extraordinary Engines'' (2008) features newer steampunk stories by some of the genre's writers, as well as other science fiction and fantasy writers experimenting with neo-Victorian conventions. A retrospective reprint anthology of steampunk fiction was released, also in 2008, by Tachyon Publications. Edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer and appropriately entitled ''Steampunk'', it is a collection of stories by James Blaylock, whose "Narbondo" trilogy is typically considered steampunk; Jay Lake, author of the novel ''Mainspring'', sometimes labeled " clockpunk"; the aforementioned Michael Moorcock; as well as Jess Nevins

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases