Rare CD-i Records #37: Cathedrales Gothiques d'Europe (Kairos Vision / Reunion des Musees Nationaux, 1994)
This CD-i disc was released in France in a very low quantity. It shows us 35 cathedrales of France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Germany and United Kingdom, including 2000 images and about 10 minutes of video material. We spoke to an employee who worked at Kairos Vision: "The collective memory of european heritage received renewed interest. The Reunion des Musees nationaux teamed up with Kairos Vision to start a collection series named 'Monumenta', with this one, Cathedrales Gothiques d'Europe' to be the first one in this series. It was exclusively devoted to the preservation of this European memory. They intended hereby a structuration of the european electronic edition.
"The Gothic Cathedrals of Europe" is some kind of image book unique by virtue of precision of its iconography. Each of the 35 cathedrals chosen is the subject of a descriptive campaign of 100 to 150 images. The comparisons between two buildings can therefore be made on a term to term basis. The program was delivered on the major platforms of electronic edition : CD-I, CD-ROM, CD-PHOTO for digital images, but also on cassettes and paper booklets. The informations given on each of these supports was adapted to the segment of the target market : a CD-I for the large market of art and travel lovers, a CD-ROM for scientific research and preservation, CD-PHOTO as "on site" product in kiosk systems, cassettes and booklets being the platform devoted to a public who is more attached to the supports of traditional editions."
When you count all compatible CD-i discs, including all video-cd's, CD-i bridge titles and CD-i Rainbow formats, there are thousands of discs to collect. Even today, after 20 years of CD-i researching, there are unknown CD-i titles popping up. As the CD-i community discovers so many titles lately, we are passing by all of them in a new series of chronicles on Interactive Dreams: The Rare CD-i Records.
[Cover by an anonymous contributor. Thanks to CD-i members Arethius RGC, Omegalfa and Candela]