Gothic Art in Spotlight: Cabinets of wonder by Christine Davenne and Christine Fleurent

This post is about an art book, if one likes to call it that or a reference book. The book is Cabinets of wonder by Christine Davenne (text) and Christine Fleurent (photos). I got the version in English, but the original is in French. I bought it in Oslo, Norway a few months ago.

This book is about cabinets of curiosities and wonder, why people have started to make them, collect things and organize them. According to Christine Davenne, cabinets of curiosities are closely linked to the evolution and progress of arts and science. They reflect the ideas of Renaissance and are practically little museums.

The content of Cabinets of wonder is divided into six chapters and those chapters are of different themes the cabinets may have. The chapter named 'Exoticae: Monsters from Elswhere' is sure to interest a goth. Cabinets of Exoticae are filled with oddities, peculiar and grotesque items or individuals, for example deformed Siamese twins skull or a 'mermaid' which is unfortunately a forgery.

On left the Mermaid, on right a stuffed guitarfish.

It would be awesome to own a cabinet of curiosities, even though those little exhibitions tend to collect dust. This book is not a DIY manual, but it is a wide presentations of different cabinets of wonder from different periods of time and the final chapter is 'The Cabinet of Wonder Today' with a subtitle 'In which the cabinet of curiosities has become the model for contemporary art exhibition.' After reading this, one could very well start to collect and create her or his own cabinet.

These are from the Cabinets of scientific interests.

In summary, the photos in this book are beautiful and many of them are creepy too and the text is intelligent and provokes new thoughts about our culture and humanity.

DIY: Gingerbread Dinosaurs

As I mentioned in a previous post, me and my friends are spending the Yule/Christmas together and were planning to do less traditional gingerbread installation. Unfortunately we did not buy enough gingerbread dough and before we had the chance to plan the whole installation with the meteor and a volcano, the dough was no more. So all we got is some dinosaurs.

The inspiration came from two little molds I found with a friend, but since they really were tiny, we needed to make some more from cardboard. Unfortunately I did not remember to take a pic of them. But I do have some photos from the edible dinosaurs.

Carefully placing the T-Rex 

After the oven

Above you can see the T-Rex with some not that impressive sugar frosting. I think this is a great evidence of the unfortunate fact that I am not an artist, or at least my skills are not that good. :D The idea of Jurassic Park scene or the Apocalypse of Dinosaurs was good, but the competence of the makers was not.

Merry Christams and happy Yule!

Gothic Art in Spotlight: Paul Delvaux

I happened to see an art program in a TV the other day. It was High Art of the Low Countries by BBC and it introduced some of the artists of Belgium and Netherlands. Thanks to this TV-show, I found out more about one particular artist: Paul Delvaux (1987-1994).

When art history happens and categories are created, Delvaux is often seen as a surrealist and that definition describes his work quite well. I also see much of macabre in his paintings. The paintings are often creepy in a more modern way, with a lot of maidens and allusions to the popular and macabre theme of "Death and Maiden". On the other hand, some Delvaux's works refer to older macabre art, like deathbeds from the Middle Ages.

Source

Source

Also the macabre art from 15th century to 16th century have a lot of surrealistic themes and situations, so I guess it once again comes down to context. One of my favorite artists from that era is Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450-1516). There is a huge similarity between Delvaux painting in the second picture and these two:

Source

Source

Although these paintings of Delvaux and these details of Bosch's paintings are similar, the context was different when they were made and the word "art" did not mean the same thing during the 16th century as it does during the 20th century. When Bosch painted, the Renaissance was slowly kicking in, but his paintings are more medieval in theme, which is about christian beliefs of Hell and Sin and other things that were important themes during the Middle Ages when life was hard, there were many wars and pestilence. Delvaux's art was created in a different atmosphere. He lived both of the World Wars, but the knowledge of Medicine escalated during his lifetime and an ordinary cold could not kill that easily and therefore the meaning of Death in the culture was indeed different and that makes the macabre art of the Middle Ages and the 20th century different from each other.

4 easy ways to goth up the Holidays

In this post I am going to point out four easy ways to goth up the celebrations that occur in the latter half of December. One reason for this post is that I am going to spend my Christmas with some friends and we are going to do all kinds of funny things, since we all represent the darker subcultures. I shall make posts about them in the end of December. 

1. The Gingerbread House
Instead of the traditional gingerbread house you could try to make the house of The Addams Family as a 2D background for example and then the characters in front of it. Or, if you have to spend Christmas with people who are not going to allow you to do anything too bold, just add two little gingerbread men to the traditional installaton and call them Hansel and Gretel. Me and my friends are probably going to make an installation of the final days of the dinosaurs or a dramatic Jurassic Park scenario.


2. Snowman
I saw one with devil horns in a park the other day. Too bad I did not have my camera with me. So the tip is, why not make a really sinister looking snowman next to the gates of your garden? See if any Christmas carollers dear to knock your door.


3. Candles
This time of the year is mostly dark and all celebration is concentrated around the day when sun is starting to shine a bit more, basically all celebration in the end of December is about celebrating the turning point of winter towards spring and summer. Generally people tend to burn more candles when it is dark and cold, but some people claim people used to burn a lot of candles and torches during the winter solstice to encourage sun to "win the darkness".

I am not going to say goths are the children of darkness or anything that cheesy, but I'd like to point out that a lonely candle makes the darkness around seem even more dark. Candles seem to be widely accepted decorations in goth subculture and so they are when it comes to christmas ornaments. But those candles with happy little elves and reindeer are not that goth-y. On the other hand I think those candles with an elf or an angel decoration are a bit perverse and sadistic. I mean, you burn them. The little happy elves are going to melt.


4. Special Christmas decorations
There are a lot of little enterprises who make all kinds of decorations and I am quite sure a goth can find a lot of creepy and kooky ornaments online. I myself bought some silver hand grenade ornaments for the spruce. First of all I think they are pretty in a very disturbing way. Secondly, I do not believe violence is productive way to solve conflicts and I think these ornaments can be seen as a joke or a twisted way to reflect how people have through out times justified a lot of violence, death and war with religion.

Gothic Art in Spotlight: Human Anatomy since Renaissance

It has again been an awful long time since I have posted and the reason is that I am under a lot of stress at the moment. But now I would like to introduce to you a book I bought a long time a go at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm.

The name of the book is Human Anatomy. Depicting the Body from the Renaissance to Today by Benjamin A. Rifkin, Michael J. Ackerman and Judith Folkenberg. It was published 2006 by Thames&Hudson.

Basically this book is art history, and there are a huge amount of pictures of human bodies. I believe one of the reasons the book starts from the Renaissance is that before that it was not socially acceptable to go and study human bodies. Basically it could have been a social suicide to dig around in a dead member of the society. But when the natural sciences got a steadier position, people started to examine human body and the paintings and drawings of entrails became more life-like.

In this picture above you can see how carefully the face and expression if it's face are drawn, even though the actual point of the drawing is to teach anatomy and show the entrails.

In the picture below you can detect traces of Medieval morality and the Dance Macabre. In the upper left corner is a skeleton, called to Judgement. In the lower right there is a bunch of dead interrupting a evening of idle play.

I consider many of the pictures this Human Anatomy contains to be suitable for a goth. I would take every single one of those drawings above and hang them on my wall!

By the way, I am sorry for the poor quality of the pictures, it seems to be, that something in my camera has been broken. No matter how I alter the settings, it keeps thinking that there is not enough light and the pics are blurred. I must check if the warranty is still on.

Thanks for reading!

Samhain: a Party and a trip to the Graveyard

This is going to be rather a different post compared to the ones I usually make. I am going to tell about my ways of celebrating Samhain this year.

Yesterday (31st of October) I spent in solitude with a really important person in my life. We did things we enjoy and things that strengthen confidence between us and talked about some very personal stuff. This lovely evening was like rays of sun, shining into a dark room and all because somebody had the courage to peek between the curtains.

Today (1st of November) I am going to a theater with this friend of mine to see The Addams Family Musical. I really hope it is going to be indeed funny and not too farce-like. The beginning situation is that Wednesday has fallen in love with a normal male person and this creates a lot of drama, since especially Morticia thinks that is a bad thing. Or at least that is what the summary says at the theater's home page. Unfortunately the page is in Finnish only, so I am not linking it. But the play is an adaptation of the Broadway show. Apparently it is 'an original story' (of Charles Addams, I suppose) but as far as I am concerned, that sentence on the web page could also mean that it is an original story meaning that it (acceptance and kids growing up) is something everybody has to ponder in their life and has been for many centuries now.

Samhain: the door to the world of Dead is open!

I must say I am a tiny bit skeptical of this plot, because I have always seen Addams Family as a tolerant and open family, who (especially in the old TV-series) try not to judge anyone and most of all Morticia is the one trying to be the mediator. But we'll see how the play turns out!

2nd of November there is a goth club in my hometown, celebrating Samhain. I am attending it, but before that I have the most coolest lecture ever. Yes, I have a lecture on Saturday, All Hollows' Eve on a local Cemetery at 7 p.m.! I t is a part of a course in Literature Studies called The Traditions of Macabre and our university teacher is going to hold one of the lessons at a grave yard. After the lecture I am off to home, quickly change to party outfit and head to the goth club. I think it would be not that respectful for those other people, who might be at the cemetery, greeting their dear departed, if I was in a latex dress or something. Also, there is going to be really cold, so i would catch a cold if I'd wander around in a mini skirt!

Happy Halloween and Mysterious Samhain!

Books for goths with kids, or just for goths who enjoy picture books

After a small hiatus I am going to introduce two books of Stanislav Marijanovic. These are picture books for children, or people who generally enjoy picture books. They both introduce a cavalcade of monsters and House Monsters, who are lurking in the our world.

A Manual of House Monsters

The first book is A Manual of House Monsters. The story is, that the narrator has made a research about House Monsters, small monsters who could also be seen as little devils or fiends, who produce all inconvenient things in peoples lives, like runny noses, narcissistic behavior, or if somebody is being really impatient.

In this picture you can see on the left the monster who makes you feel impatient and on the right is the monster who makes you feeling like you do not want to share anything, whether it is candy or toys.


The second book is A Family Guide to House Monsters II, and it depicts some monster you could find in a ordinary household. I have the Finnish edition, so I have no idea what the names of the monsters are in English, but these monster try to affect peoples lives or make little tricks to make things inconvenient for human inhabitants of the household.

In this picture you can see the Sugar Sisters (Sokrusiskot) who have a sweet tooth and make you too crave for cakes and candy! Of course this book also gives tips how to handle all monsters and how one can even enjoy their company every now and then.

Sugar Sisters

In the picture below one can have a glimpse of a Stress Monster, who mainly attacks adults and from this book especially children can find useful advice, how to make the adults notice, that too much stress is not good!

Stress Monster

I myself had these books as a kid, but I do enjoy them still. Actually I have found new things in them every time I read the books! The pictures of the books are extremely cute and one could see these imaginative characters as art, in the same way other novels are art.