Muybridge and Stanford’s efforts were part of a wider fascination shared by many people of their time. Doctors and philosophers studied the phenomenon of “apparent motion” and tried to understand it. Why do images shown in rapid succession sometimes merge into one? Why do spinning wheels sometimes appear to stop? The nineteenth century was fascinated by movement. It was an age of inventions that served as teaching aids, toys – and often both.

It was also an age of scientific inquiry and a pursuit of accuracy. Muybridge’s photographs had a profound influence on how movement should be depicted “correctly” – and not only the movement of horses. While some painters pursued “photographic accuracy”, others gradually began to portray the world as we actually perceive it: not as a camera records it, but as it appears to us.

Paradoxically, the pursuit of realism also gave rise to Impressionism and Cubism. It reminded us that every form of representation reflects its time. Painters who did not use perspective did not see the world differently from us, nor were they less skilled or more naïve.