Put on the right glasses to rediscover the genius optician Pierre-Louis Guinand, 200 years after his death: this is what the temporary exhibition “From Guinand the watchmaker to Guinand the optician” offers, which will be open from this Friday and until June 29 at the Locle Watchmaking Museum. The opening takes place Thursday at 7 p.m., in the presence of the historian Julien Gressot, who found in the Château des Monts the setting to promote his research work. “The new angle is to connect [Guinand] to the world of watchmaking,” summarizes Julien Gressot.
Pierre-Louis Guinand was first a carpenter in La Corbatière, before becoming a watchmaker and then an optician. He settled in Les Brenets, on the banks of the Doubs, to benefit from the hydraulic power necessary for his tireless work as an artisan in search of the perfect glass. A work that gave him international fame. His contribution made it possible to enlarge the astronomical instruments of the time and today earned him the status of a pioneer of modern optics.
It was because Guinand had always been a watchmaker that he became a passionate optician: “One of the concerns of watchmakers of that era was the measurement of time. And to determine the time, you need astronomical glasses,” explains Julien Gressot.
Time has left us very few objects by Pierre-Louis Guinand. An astronomical telescope attributed to him was loaned by the La Chaux-de-Fonds History Museum for the temporary exhibition. The curator of the Locle Watchmaking Museum Morghan Mootoosamy and the curator of the exhibition (Julien Gressot) also managed to acquire a few pieces of glass, witnesses to Guinand's tests. Documents from the City Library of La Chaux-de-Fonds, the public and university library and the state archives complete the exhibition. /vco
