Unidentified Artiste Inspires Photographers and Painters for Over 100 Years

Like too many of our favorite images, this card has come and gone in a matter of a few hours, but she and her fabulous costume can have a place on our blog forever. We don't know the model's name, but we love this image!

SOLD Unidentified Artiste in Costume Orientale, c. 1910

The same model appears on another postcard below, image by Jean Agelou.

Grace La Rock, who, with Helmut Schmidt, operates Boudoir Cards, a beautiful site and a valuable source of information on postcards of La Belle Époque, as well as French and ethnic erotic postcards, has done a watercolor painting inspired by Agélou's image of our unidentified model. Helmut and Grace are customers of ours and, on hearing about this painting, we asked if we might share it on our blog. So many of our customers are involved in art of one sort or another and draw inspiration from these fine old images, and we are so very pleased when we can share examples of this with our readers. Below, is the original postcard image and the painting Grace created from it. Just wonderful.

Photograph by Jean Agélou of Unidentified Artiste Lounging in Lingerie and Wonderful Hat

Original Painting by Grace La Rock

Here is what Grace had to say about this painting:

Capturing me with her hypnotic eyes, and voluptuous curves, I find this vintage doll rather intriguing. She was my first water color rendering after almost 20 years. I prefer pale vintage rose for color, but chose to make her into more of a cupcake like she is. I plan to paint other poses of her in the future with more muted tones. This photograph was originally made by Jean Agélou, and shows that nudity is not necessary to become erotic. If only I had her hat and vintage lingerie.

The Sounds Of New York City, Circa 1920

We just finished listening to The Sounds of New York City, Circa 1920 from NPR's All Things Considered. This wonderful piece is tremendously evocative, and we highly recommend it for anyone with an interest in the times.

The sounds used in the NPR program were collected by Emily Thompson, a Princeton University history professor who has put together a website, The Roaring Twenties: An Interactive Exploration of the Historical Soundscape of New York City, which provides sound clips from the 1920s and '30s. Also highly recommended.

Dramatically Tinted Images from La Belle Époque

These gorgeous and weirdly ethereal images were accomplished using a type of coloration that was briefly popular during the early part of the twentieth century and which sometimes achieved amazing results. We know their vivid shades resulted from early experimentation with color tinting, but we simply can't find any credible information about the process used to create these fantastically tinted images. Over and over again, while researching hand-tinting of vintage photographs, we stumble across the sentiment that color was added to black and white photographs due to a desire to create images that more accurately mimicked life, but these images show that there were often other, more artistic, aesthetics at work.

The first of these images uses shades of blue fading into yellow. This enhances the impression that the woman in the picture is standing just on the border between shadow and illumination. While there are many possible interpretations of the symbolism in standing on the verge of both darkness and light, our favorite is that of standing with one foot in the mundane world and the other in Faerie, and such perception would be very in keeping with the sentiments of the era.

AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE Dramatically Tinted Belle Epoque Image of Young Woman, circa 1905

The following two images seem to be from a single photo shoot and were produced by the same studio as the first, although with a different model. Here, the coloration helps to lend an air of mystery and romance to the young woman, while her filmy gown and scarf, the draped couch upon which she reclines, and the decor, complete with potted palm, all contribute the sense that one has been given a rare glimpse into the Sultan's palace. The rich colors in the two images create very different moods: the seated figure could almost be a mermaid under the sea, while the deep fuchsia lends a sultry sensuality to the image of the reclining woman.

SOLD Dramatically Tinted Belle Epoque Boudoir Image, circa 1905

SOLD Dramatically Tinted Belle Epoque Harem Image, circa 1905

The last of our featured items is a postcard in which Mademoiselle Lo appears in a body stocking and veil. Body stockings were used for a short time at the turn of the century in an attempt to avoid prosecution for violation of decency laws discouraging onstage and photographic nudity, but the intended effect was that the actress appeared to be nude, or very nearly so. In this image, the cloudy sky on the left side of the image, along with Mlle. Lo's arm, face, and a bit of her torso, have been shaded with a deep rose, hinting perhaps of some impending storm or doom. Below the horizon, the shade used is a deep blue, suggestive of water, so that we may imagine that Mlle. Lo has just stepped from the sea onto land. Perchance she portrays some magical being of the sea, come to air herself for a short time before returning to her watery home. Or, maybe she is depicting a character in a play whose reasons for standing on this lonely beach are more tragic, or more playful. We may never know the full story behind this image, but we find its beauty and mystery haunting.

AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE Mademoiselle Lo, French Artiste Nude en Voile, Fantaisie, circa 1905

Early Steampunk Inspirations

While Steampunk's connections to the Victorian era are well-documented, we contend that the estheatic that developed as a result of the introduction of an increasing number of new technologies continued into the early part of the twentieth century, as can be seen in these wonderful, evocative cards from that era. We love the mix of cultures, too, which allowed for such pictures at that below, in which the men wear such different hats: newsboy, beret, turban, and our top hat wearer has even got a monocle! Clearly, this was:

The First Steampunk Convention!

AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE The First Steampunk Convention 1920s RPPC

We jest... these guys are just revelers, dressing up, drinking beer, and having a good time. Fun old RPPC from the 1920s, unless...they actually travel through time and space in a TARDIS-like vehicle, and someone managed to get a photo of them before they whisked off to ancient Rome, or maybe Tralfamagar, or, well, really...that could be what's going on here! We just deal in old postcards, and photographs, and only occasionally time travel... such as can be seen in:

Three Brothers in a Time Machine

AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE Three Brothers in a Time Machine

Okay, so it's not a time machine, but our cards, in their own peculiar way, might as well be time machines. They certainly have a way of taking one back to magical places and times. Great "Steampunk" atmosphere.