At the end of the 1990s, the Holography Museum was closed by Matthias Lauk and its approximately 350 exhibits were looking for new owners. In order to be able to assess holographic art, the view must not be obscured by 3D animations, stereoscopic images or simulated pseudo-3D effects with red-green orthogonal glasses. Otherwise the careless assessment of the ignorant takes place too quickly, one is on the level of souvenir articles.
But even with a little insight into the holographic recording and display technology, one quickly becomes aware of the complexity of the creation process of a real, holographic art object, at the end of which perhaps "only" a virtual hammer can be seen that hits a physical nail or something similar virtual faucet that seems to come out of nowhere and protrudes into the room - touching allowed.
For those who are knowledgeable, however, it is always a sublime moment when a transparent glass plate on which "only" the interference pattern of the wave fields of coherent reference and object waves is stored, and when the right lighting is used, a real three-dimensional object appears.
Fortunately, the department head of the cultural office of the city of Pulheim, Ms. Angelika Schallenberg, has the special features of this art direction in view and keeps five impressive exhibits from the Lauk art collection for the public. They are well positioned in the town hall, accessible to everyone (see Figs. 6 and 7) and we were allowed to photograph them and present them in this article. Two-dimensional photographs are a little powerless to grasp the three-dimensional character of the works of art - a few free-hand videos at the end of this article therefore complement the series of photos.
