Messy Nessy Chic has a gallery showcasing Frida Kahlo’s fashion and it’s relationship to her life and work. And you can see her dresses, corsets, headpieces, jewellery and other articles on display in Mexico City at the Museo Frida Kahlo until Nov. 22, 2013. (Thanks, K.A. Laity!)
“As early as 1929 Kodak identified the potential for colour to affect the emotions. Whilst Kodak developed Sonochrome tints like Rose Doree to ‘quicken the respiration’ and Peachblow for ‘brief, joyous moments’, twenty years before, Méliès applied translucent aniline dyes to create spectacle and to provoke sensation in nascent cinema.” Wendy Haslem writes on the [...]
The Flapper Girl has amazing resources on Twenties and Thirties art, design, illustration, millinery, and, especially, Flappers. Meanwhile, The Library of Congress has a sweet selection of articles on “The Rise of the Flapper!“
When humanity, subjugated by the terror of crime, has been driven insane by fear and horror, and when chaos has become supreme law, then the time will have come for the empire of crime.” –The Testament of Dr. Mabuse “[W]hatever factors come into play in the cases that we have studied, the conclusion is inescapable [...]
The Hairpin‘s Anne Helen Petersen has written an excellent piece on Cary Grant’s career and life–scandals, Randolph Scott, sartorial brilliance and all: “Grant’s image was in many ways univocal — he played variations of the same character, he seemed to be a ladies’ man on and off the screen — but it also had room [...]
Watch the work of 100 masters of animated short film in 9 minutes.
True Classics has a lovely retrospective of vaudevillian, cartoonist and animator, Winsor McCay. “McCay got his start in entertainment doing “chalk talks” on the vaudeville circuit. Much like J. Stuart Blackton, a groundbreaking figure in early animation in his own right, McCay drew figures on a chalkboard and altered them during his performance….In 1911, Blackton and McCay [...]
The Library of Congress has an online exhibit on the history of illustration, cartoons, animation, single panel gag cartoons and comic strips in the United States. (via @fantagraphics)
Possibly the world’s first old dark house movie, The Haunted House (1908) by Segundo de Chomón and the first vampire/Satanic castle movie, Le Manoir du Diable (1896) by Georges Méliès. (Thanks, Keith and Teleport City!)
“A hero can be anyone, even a man doing something as simple and reassuring as putting a coat around a young boy’s shoulders to let him know the world hasn’t ended.” “The mask is to show that Batman could be anybody.” Is saying anyone can be Batman the same as saying anyone can be a [...]
In anticipation of The Elephant Man Joseph Merrick’s birthday next month, Abebooks’ Avid Reader has compiled a short history of John Merrick’s life and a gallery of books about Merrick, sideshow histories and biographies as well as a few promotional cards from the late 19th century.
Abebooks has a gorgeous gallery of Russian Avant Garde book cover illustration from the end of the Czarist era through the 1930s.
As a follow up to “The Yellow Curse,” Grady Hendrix has posted a gallery of images offering a tour of racist stereotypes of Chinese people from 1881 to the present.
Grady Hendrix has written a fascinating piece about Chinese-American life and Chinatowns in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries and a story he’s written about it. “If you were an average Chinese living in New York’s Chinatown at the turn of the century, your life sucked. You had a thriving, albeit mostly male, community [...]
Pornokitsch writer (and Kitschies judge) Jared Shurin writes about fairies as fuel and the vast potential of Steampunk as a resource for discussing industrialization.
Silent Toronto‘s Eric Veillette takes a look at censorship and the Ontario Censor Board from 1911 till now.
In the 1998 New York Times Review of Science Fiction, Samuel Delany writes about the history of African-American writers of science fiction, race and racism in science fiction and why Octavia Butler might wonder, “Why, when you invite me, do you always invite that guy, Delany?”
In his video essay (also available in text form), Matthias Stork details the elements of what he calls, “Chaos Cinema” and their effects on film and viewer experience: “The film doesn’t seduce you into suspending your disbelief. It bludgeons you until you give up.”
The Library of Congress’ “The Origins of American Animation” collection includes Krazy Kat, The Kazenjammer Kids and Keeping Up With The Joneses shorts dating from 1900 through 1921.
A couple of looks at the art and history of film title sequences.
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