“Time Machines” is a pop exhibition that speaks to all science and astrophysics enthusiasts, and focuses on the National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF), its people and its research. An exhibition made up of images, sounds and words that emerge through the best technologies available and with a modern, accessible and inclusive language. We have created a path for you that wants to play between the old and the new, with an 80s style, but with contents that speak of today and tomorrow and that use the game as a mechanism to arouse interest and positive emotion.
What are the “Time Machines”? Tools of Italian ingenuity, the result of research conducted in INAF observatories by women and men who put commitment and passion into expanding our boundaries of knowledge.
This exhibition wants to discuss science and astrophysics while showing who is “behind the eyepiece”. An immersive experience that begins first of all with ourselves, with the visitors, then moving on to Galileo, the Italian who, placing his eye on the telescope, used our first “time machine”.
The light is the centre of our journey. With its speed, light does not allow us to see the present but rather the past. Thanks to light, it is thus possible to travel through time by looking at the sky, and the further away you observe, the further back in time you look, as in authentic “Time Travel”!
The exhibition is aimed at everyone, with particular attention to families and school groups.
THE NUMBER OF TIME MACHINE
THE EXHIBITION
The exhibition itinerary unfolds across three rooms. We start from a familiar setting: a starry sky, with the invitation to repeat the experience that Galileo had over 400 years ago, pointing an “enhanced eye”, the telescope, towards the firmament.
From here begins a journey through the planets of our cosmic neighborhood, the Solar System, recreated on the scale of the city of Rome and proposed again in a playful version with a real 1980s-style arcade.
The journey continues between planets, stars, galaxies and gigantic clusters of galaxies, embracing the immense cosmic scales that the “time machines” of contemporary astrophysics try to grasp, up to the dawn of the universe. Through a combination of iconic images, interactive exhibits and innovative technologies such as virtual reality, those who visit the exhibition will come into direct contact with the challenges of research which, day after day, increasingly pushes the limits of our knowledge.
Visitors to the exhibition will undertake a real “journey through time” whose central theme is light which, with its speed, does not allow us to see the present but rather the past. Thanks to light it is possible to travel through time by looking at the sky: the further away we look, the further back in time we can see. A journey that will introduce the public to the main Italian research body for the study of the universe and which wants to play between the old and the new, but with contents that speak of today and the future.
THE LABORATORY
THE EXHIBITION
The exhibition itinerary unfolds across three rooms. We start from a familiar setting: a starry sky, with the invitation to repeat the experience that Galileo had over 400 years ago, pointing an “enhanced eye”, the telescope, towards the firmament.
From here begins a journey through the planets of our cosmic neighborhood, the Solar System, recreated on the scale of the city of Rome and proposed again in a playful version with a real 1980s-style arcade.
The journey continues between planets, stars, galaxies and gigantic clusters of galaxies, embracing the immense cosmic scales that the “time machines” of contemporary astrophysics try to grasp, up to the dawn of the universe. Through a combination of iconic images, interactive exhibits and innovative technologies such as virtual reality, those who visit the exhibition will come into direct contact with the challenges of research which, day after day, increasingly pushes the limits of our knowledge.
Visitors to the exhibition will undertake a real “journey through time” whose central theme is light which, with its speed, does not allow us to see the present but rather the past. Thanks to light it is possible to travel through time by looking at the sky: the further away we look, the further back in time we can see. A journey that will introduce the public to the main Italian research body for the study of the universe and which wants to play between the old and the new, but with contents that speak of today and the future.
THE LABORATORY
The exhibition is aimed at everyone, with particular attention to families and school groups. “Macchine del tempo” offers, for nursery schools, primary schools and families, a series of educational workshops to explore and discover the wonders of the cosmos together. All the educational and inclusive activities of the exhibition are carried out in collaboration with Oae – Italia. There are also ad hoc guided tours for lower and upper secondary schools.