Eye portaits...

ngaio · 01-07-09 09:00:43

Just thought this was lovely and wanted to share because sharing is caring.

http://www.filthygorgeousthings.com/voy … -portraits

artist_charlotte_v · 02-07-09 09:15:32

I collect victorian mourning jewelry and would do some very depraved things to get my hands on a eye portrait.

ngaio · 03-07-09 01:19:54

Haha, I don't even have any sort of collection like that and I'd STILL do some very depraved things to get my hands on an eye portrait!

Xebeche · 03-07-09 02:41:33

I had never heard of these - very interesting.

Would either of you actually wear one if it had personal significance from a dead friend/lover? To wear one in this time period would seem to be akin to, I don't know, the first woman to throw in a nose ring. Wearing memorabilia of the dead to a gathering would cause so much discomfort when people discovered its meaning.

We (perhaps present company excluded) try so hard to close our eyes to death now, that it's almost hard for me to imagine a culture where the majority of a group of people would don these for a gala.

adele_w · 03-07-09 04:16:49

It's a pretty strange image - a room full of people wearing little eyes on their lapels. It'd be like a paranoiac's nightmare with so many unblinking eyes following them around the room. I think I'll write that scene into a film one day. Or pass it on to David Lynch.

After Prince Albert died Queen Victoria went into a three year period of mourning. She started wearing all black and flashing bling made out of jet (a black glassy gemstone) and in respect the public followed her morbid fashion style. During that time it was also popular to wear jewelry made out of human hair - again, of loved ones, living or dead - sometimes woven and sometimes used to make delicate miniature portraits of the person to whom the hair belonged. It's pretty romantic that such significance was given to these remnants of the physical which perhaps is neglected a bit in this day and age in which photographic or moving images are deemed the closest replica/record of a real person.

ngaio · 03-07-09 04:34:48

Wow, miniature portraits using hair? That's inspiring me somehow...

I'm also thinking about memento mori now: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memento_mori

And now I'm reminded of an old Disney cartoon full of dancing skeletons which I've been meaning to show Bobby. Bobby! Check it ouuuta!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkhxjzc9uuE

#1 01-07-09 09:00:43

Eye portaits...

#2 02-07-09 09:15:32

Re: Eye portaits...

#3 03-07-09 01:19:54

Re: Eye portaits...

#4 03-07-09 02:41:33

Re: Eye portaits...

#5 03-07-09 04:16:49

Re: Eye portaits...

#6 03-07-09 04:34:48

Re: Eye portaits...

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