Click to Enlarge
“Her Majesty the Ballerina” (by Figuier), is from a satirical Catalan almanac from 1907. (My friend Valerie from Barcelona sent me this artwork and explained it to me). The caption says: "The flower of the stage is anointed with mistletoe, Young and old who approach her fall prisoner at her feet". Valerie says this was a wicked old way to catch birds: 'The word "viscosity" derives from the Latin word "viscum" for mistletoe. A viscous glue was made from mistletoe berries and used for lime-twigs to catch birds.'
3 comments:
What a treat in my email this morning!
Happy New Year to you too!
I just love this differently wicked Ballerina and the discription (thanks Valerie).
Who knew Viscum refered to the sticky glue from Mistletoe - I had to laugh. It's interesting to learn odd things people would believe and why, but this particular story is one of the very best!
Would like to see more of the book where the picture was found. Heading over to Google search in a minute...
Absolutely love your blog and website. Your artwork & music are amazing!! A few years ago I first saw a couple of your paintings while thumbing through graphics on www.ffffound.com and was hooked.
OK, so I'm a groupie lol..
If you get a chance check out one of my blogs (always under construction) that feature your work. http://cjgrs.blogspot.com/.
Hope you have a wonderful day and a blessed 2010!
Celia
Hi Celia-
Glad you like it! All thanks to Valerie. She did the research and scanned the image. I love this illustration, too. I will check out your blog.
Happy New Year!
xx
Amy
Glad you liked the graphic. Maybe kissing under the gluey mistletoe is connected, magic to keep people together.
Celia, the scan is from "L'Esquella de la Torratxa"
- The (cow)bell on the watchtower. I found the remains of several bound copies of their yearly almanacs from late 19th early 20th century. Unfortunately most of the graphics are very small and the quality of the paper isn't good but this one was full page and as soon as I saw it I thought of Amy.
I did a google search today for "l'esquella" and discovered someone here in Barcelona called Joan Navarro Badia - a publisher, a collector, with a passion for Catalan graphic art and who has several blogs with lots of scans, a few from the "esquella" :
http://vinyetes.blogspot.com/
Happy New Year!
Valerie
Post a Comment