Philly-Bob’s Public Domain Free-for-All 2014 One man's art and ideas, many using digital manipulation of images from the Public Domain, and other thought on various topics.

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Artist's Statement
Although I have been interested in art and graphic design all my life, I only began working seriously after my retirement in 2011. These images -- digital manipulations of images from the Public Domain -- are highly personal works of art. I am currently working in a graphic style influenced by the grainy biological "light shows" I saw when I was in a near-hallucinatory state from the anesthesia after open-heart surgery. The subject matter is also influenced by what I see when I dream -- the surreal, the ordinary, the puzzling, the unsettling. Finally, there is a strong influence of commercial art, especially since Msrch 12, when I started using type in my compositions.

I try to keep up on the latest additions to the Public Domain (PD), a daunting task. For a year I followed the U.S.-based Internet Archive which has over 5 million PD files and adds a new one every minute. Lately, I have been looking at Gallica, the PD site of France. It's all like drinking from a firehose, a post-retirement desk job. Because of the world's crazy copyright laws, much PD material is monochromatic, between 50 and 100 years old. This gives my work an antique look.

For more on PD issues, see this Wikipedia article, this group, this manifesto, and this online magazine. Here are some other, international sources, and here is a recent article about PD issues. The Open Knowledge Foundation is working on a Public Domain Calculator to make it easier to figure public domain issues.

For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.

Herringbone Movie Smooch & Baby Snookums Church
   
From the June 1927 Variety a romantic illustration showing actress Billie Dove embracing Ben Lyon in the 1927 movie The Tender Hour (1). That image is superimposed on a drawing of the herringbone pattern used for the medieval vaulting for a Connecticut church, as shown in Acousti-Celotex's Colorful decoration with good acoustics (2).
Next to that, a composition from the same sources: some sort of Baby Snookums contest in a Variety ad (1) and a ceiling tile herringbone treatment from a Massachusetts church (2).
Both Janice and I are nervously overworking because there is one of those significant doctor's appointments tomorrow for Janice.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/variety87-1927-06
Link2: archive.org/details/ColorfulDecorationWithGoodAcoustics
Monday, June 23, 2014

Acoustic Ceiling Panel & Light Fixtures
   
A composition of two illustrations from building equipment catalogs: (1) an undated (but probably approx. 1915) illustration of light fixtures from Distinctive lighting equipment by Cleveland's Kayline Co. and (2) an illustration of patterned acoustic ceiling tile from another undated catalog, Colorful decoration with good acoustics, by Chicago's Acousti-Celotex Co. Note two treatments: one with text, one without. Fine artists on the Greece trip were very critical of my use of text; somehow, once something was identified as, for instance, ceiling tile and light fixtures, they couldn't see the inherent beauty of the pattern and colors. It wasn't Art. I didn't think much of this point of view, but I may have to adapt to it if I start selling. Also, there is a difference in framing between the two images -- a whole other issue.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/DistinctiveLightingEquipment
Link2: archive.org/details/ColorfulDecorationWithGoodAcoustics
Monday, June 23, 2014

A Lady and her Tweaker
 
From the June, 1927 issue of the theatrical publication Variety, an image of a young woman used to advertise The Tweaker, a scissor-like device for "theatrical women," used to remove unwanted hair from arms and legs. An informative retrospective look at the product appears on the Glamourologist website. Nowadays, the word has different meanings.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/variety87-1927-06
Friday, June 21, 2014

Photographic Proof of Spirits
 
From the 1905 Photographic Amusements : including a description of a number of novel effects obtainable with the camera, a discussion of the "scientific" photographs of the mid 19th century study centered on the study of Spiritualism and Ghosts. Turns out, the author explains, this image was a product of re-using glass in the photographic process: a double exposure. It is hard to believe that anyone could have taken this seriously.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/photographicamus00wood_0
Friday, June 21, 2014

Plastic Club Portraits
   
Every Thursday morning, I go to the still life workshop at Philadelphia's Plastic Club. Everybody does their own thing. Many work from a still life set up by the teacher. I put a mirror behind the still life and grab reflected portraits of my fellow students.
And here's two older ones:
     

Announcement
I'm going to learn how to write apps/programs for the Android operating system. Right now, I have an Android phone and I intend to get an Android tablet. Since I have some programming background in the language Python, I hope to use the free program QPython. You can follow my progress Android Programming Project. May mark a decline in time spent on art and co-op politics.

More Marketing of Anxiety
 
Two more photographic images from ads in the 1940 Silver Screen, marketing products catering to women's social anxiety. In the top illustration, a glamorous young woman pleadingly asks a friend Then why have I never married? in an advertisement for Listerine for Halitosis. In the bottom illustration a young wife sobs at her piano under the withering glare of her husband. Headline: Voted the Ideal Couple. But her husband knew of her "ONE NEGLECT." Lysol could have helped her. on the subject of "personal intimate cleanliness." Lysol? WTF? See this article on the cynical marketing of dangerous products like Lysol for douches and birth control.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/silverscreen10unse_0
Monday, June 16, 2014

The Marketing of Anxiety
 
Three illustrations from ads in the 1940 Silver Screen, marketing products catering to women's social anxiety. The first two are for Mum deodorant. Left, a girl ponders her isolation at a party. (Headline: "Wake up, Wallflower! Mum after your bath would have saved your Charm!") Middle: a girl stares out from behind a curtain at others socializing. (Headline: "Just a Pretty Stranger -- in her own Home Town"). Right: Two women compare symptoms. (Headline: "What if it is "THAT TIME" OF MONTH? Keep going and keep comfortable with the help of Midol?"
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/silverscreen10unse_0
Monday, June 16, 2014

Greece Trip: Hallucination in Piraeus, Our Teacher, Rails
     
(Not Public Domain.) Toward the end of our trip to Greece, Janice and I landed from a quiet ferry trip into the busy port town of Piraeus. The effect on me was hallucinogenic. This has happened to me a couple times, where my sense of sight turned psychedelic and trippy. Once was after my heart operation. Anyway, as we got off the ferry, I saw an urban jangle of impossibly dense signage. I was able to maintain contact with reality, handling luggage and directions, etc., but my visual memory took a snapshot of whirling signs. This image is my attempt to depict that memory.
Next to that is a picture of the painting teacher on that trip to Paros, Alice Meyer-Wallace.
And finally, also from Piraeus, a composite photo of two railings: background is the carved and weathered wooden rail on a highway overpass, foreground is the rail and steps of the circular stairway in our Hotel Delfina. For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Saturday, June 14, 2014

Little Book II: Colour=>B/W=>Fractal Color
Another experiment in folded book format. The images are sized correctly, but the second row should be upside down and appear before the first row in the final folding template.

	From Colour photography : and other recent developments of the art of the camera (1908) Taking the black-and-white illustrations from a 1908 book on colour photography, and adding digital color to them using the fractal filter at https://gmicol.greyc.fr/
			Source: https://archive.org/details/colourphotograph00holm_0

Little Books 1
In the week since my return, I have been somewhat confused as to what I'm doing. One thing I've been doing does not translate well into a web page. I've been making simple 8-page folded books, as shown here and in this YouTube video. A PDF of a draft of one these books, What Artists See in Mirrors, is here. What follows is an attempt to translate this into a web format.

	An artist working for a furniture company is told to create an image of a room for an upcoming catalog. In that imaginary room, there may be a dressing table, a chair, a lamp, perhaps a fashionable lady -- as in the cover. Painting such things does not present an obstacle for a trained commercial illustrator. But also in that imaginary room, the client wants the artist to show a Mirror of a certain shape. Hmm. How will the artist fill in that blank mirror shape? The viewer expects to see a visual reflection of the room's background there. But imaginary rooms do not cast reflections! The artist must imagine a background -- wall, curtains, windows -- that doesn't exist. Certainly not reality -- we're already several steps removed from ordinary reality -- but more a plausible imitation of the visual effects of a reality when not too closely examined.
These examples are from a 1928 catalog of steel bathroom cabinets from the Miami Cabinet Company, a public domain document available at archive.org/details/MiamiSteelBathroomAndIroningBoardCabinets.

Anatomy Lesson: The Nose
 
Back from Greece. Will I continue do these public domain art projects? I don't know. This one, for instance, took an hour to select original images and then another 2.5 hours to do this image. Is it worth it? One takeaway from time spent with fine artists on painting holiday in Greece: they had serious doubts about my use of text, so I am experimenting a little bit.
Anyway, this is an illustration from Thomas Bartholini's 1686 Anatome ex omnium veterum recentiorumque observationibus inprimis institutionibus (Link1) showing the nasal cavities. For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125010543912
Friday, June 6, 2014

Ravished by RINSO Suds
 
An advertisement from a 1939 Australian Women's Weekly (Link1), showing two cartoon women in joy because whites are whiter, "colours brighter, silks and woollens like new." Besides, the copywriter says, RINSO is "kind to your hands." The machine font in the dialog balloons is Quick Response (QR) code. This will be the last philly-bob.net image until early June, as I leave soon on a trip.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/The_Australian_Womens_Weekly_02_12_1939
Saturday, May 17, 2014

Illustration from Phrenology Text
 
During the 19th century, a lot of academics advocated various versions of phrenology, a theory of human types that was usually racist and is now discredited. This is from the 1911 French book Physionomie et caractère, essai de physiognomonie scientifique by Paul Hartenberg. The theory says that you can read character from facial configuration. Anyway, this is a skillfully done chart from that book showing the muscles involved in chewing. Credit where credit is due -- this ink drawing was done by accomplished illustrator Edouard Cuyer. [Note: this is in Plastic Club directory.]
Fip-off alert: Amazon is selling a printed version of this book for 20 euros, when you can download it for free. Not working much on this webpage because I'm facing a travel deadline. I will probably travel without this computer, just with IPad.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/physionomieetcar00hart
Friday, May 16, 2014

The Writing Desk
   
From the 1840 book Les Etrangers a Paris [Strangers in Paris] (Link1), a man sits at his writing desk with pen and paper. The font is Baby-Kruffy by the Font Brothers. This piece marks a major change in my working technique: for a long time I have used a layer created by Gimp's "Gradient RGB" filter to add bright primary colors. But sometimes I found the result a little nauseating, as shown in the right hand image -- especially when they are printed. In the right hand image, I removed that RGB step. My method of producing fractalized color now supplies plenty of color for the black-and-white images I so often work with.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125008713295
Saturday, May 10, 2014

Herszaft Depiction of Dolomite Legend
 
Polish painter Adam Herszaft painted this character from a European legend of the Dolomite Mountain region of Northeastern Italy. Another reworking of a small art card from the Otto Schneid collection at the University of Toronto (Link1). The notation on the back of the card is shown on right. Is the last word "pastel"? It doesn't look like pastel to me. Herszaft died in Treblinka in 1942.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 https://archive.org/details/ottoschneid16_8
Thursday, May 8, 2014

Hoherman Portrait of Woman with Child
 
Anoher Mitteleuropean artist from the 1930's, Alice Hoherman, a painter who worked in a touching children's-book style. Here she paints what, judging from the apparent halo on the child, seems to be a picture of Mary and Jesus (Link1) in a luxuriant garden. Again, this is from the Otto Schneid collection of small reproductions of paintings by Jewish artists in Europe "before 1939." Some of her other paintings, (such as this one) also had biblical themes. Hoherman died in 1943 in Auschwitz. Again, this is from the University of Toronto Otto Schneid archive.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid16_10
Thursday, May 8, 2014

Kisling Portrait of Woman
 
Still from the Otto Schneid collection of small reproductions of paintings by Jewish artists in Europe "before 1939", here is a painting by Moise Kisling, a Polish artist who survived WWII by moving to the United States, then moved back to France after the War ended. Kisling fought in both World War I and World War II.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid17_5_6
Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Guterman Portraits of Women
     
Again from the Otto Schneid collection of small reproductions of paintings by Jewish artists in Europe "before 1939", here are two more paintings by Abram Guterman (Link1). Why am I using the term mitteleuropean so often? Because it stands for a once-plausible theory of a united Europe organized as a "cosmopolitan multi-national cultural and intellectual ideal." The ideal degenerated into ignorant Nazi racial narcissism. The concept is controversial as can be seen in this Wikipedia discussion of the idea. In the painting, I like Guterman's unusual slanted framing, the touch of cubism, and his unusual use of dots. There is a notation on the back of the first painting (in the center), but I can't read it. On the right, another Guterman portrait. The font is Cocogoose by ZetaFonts.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid16_4
Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Village Scene, Europe before the Holocaust
 
Returning to the Otto Schneid collection of postcard-sized reproductions of paintings by Jewish artists in Europe "before 1939", this is a village scene painted (Link1) by Abram Guterman. A very complicated scene, with a large male figure in the foreground blending invisibly into the shop fronts. From the small B&W photo in the Schneid collection, the exact dimensions of the picture are not clear; the photograph may have been taken by propping it up against another picture. Plus, my usual framing devices.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid16_4
Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Anatomy on Interior
 
Engravings of some drawings of feet from a 17th century Scvola Perfetta per Imparare a Disegnare Tutto il Corpo Humano (Link1) collection of examples of anatomy, including some by Michelangelo. (Unfortunately, it is hard to figure out which print goes with which artist.) The image is superimposed on an engraving of a Salzburg courtyard from the 1889 Geschichte des Barockstiles und des Rococo in Deutschland (Link2).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125009488004
Link2 archive.org/details/gri_33125010501225
Sunday, May 4, 2014

Dancer at Rest
 
A painting by the 19th century German painter Bruno Piglhein, showing a young Egyptian sword dancer. It is from the 1891 Die Internationale Kunstausstellung zu Berlin [International Art Exhibition in Berlin] (Link1). Wikipedia tells us that after some initial successes, Piglhein "was not very successful. At the suggestion of his agent, he turned to pastel portraits of women; favoring Spanish dancers, pierrettes [clowns] and belles-of-the- ball with low décolletage. He then came into fashion, but also found himself being criticized as a bad moral influence and a 'courtesan painter.'" Besides her obvious physical attributes, I like the posture, poise, and cool exhibited by the sitter. The Sword Dance and Sword Dancer have a long history and live today in anime cartoons and imaginative literature.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125001104617
Saturday, May 3, 2014

Composition from Metallurgy
 
An abstract design composed of three illustrations from the 1851 The Practical Metal-Worker's Assistant: Containing the arts of working all metals and alloys, forging of iron and steel, hardening and tempering, melting and mixing, casting and founding, works in sheet metal, the processes dependent on the ductility of the metals, soldering, and the most improved processes, and tools employed by metal-workers, with the application of the art of electro-metallurgy to manufacturing processes (Link1). Barely visible, in the center, in pink, is a printed calico pattern composed of 205 metal wires. Behind that is a doubled illustration showing how to make the dies used to cast screws of three different dimensions. And in front of that is a drawing of an early machine used to cut multiple screws from one original. The image may not be as pleasing as some of my reworking of old portraits, but take a close look at the detail.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/lescontesdrolati01balz
Friday, May 2, 2014

Balzac Nightmare
 
In a frontispiece illustration titled Punition in a 1900 volume of Honore Balzac's Les Contes Drolatiques (Link1). The illustration is by Albert Robida. What a curious and awful image, showing a young woman in a crown beset by all sorts of awful demons. Four of her companions are also tortured -- can you find them? The caption says it is punishment, but for what? I don't know which Balzac story the image illustrates. Drolatiques means "humorous" in English. The English droll is somewhat different, meaning "amusing in an odd way; whimsically humorous; waggish." A friend points out that while the four companions look genuinely terrified, the queen in her crown merely looks annoyed.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/lescontesdrolati01balz
Thurday, May 1, 2014

Familiar Flightless Fowl
 
From the 1885 Poultry Culture: How to Raise, Manage, Mate and Judge Thoroughbred Fowls (Link1) a pair of chickens of the popular American breed known as Wyandotte.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/poultrycultureho00felc_0
Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Street Vendor and Song
 
From the 1874 La Comédie de Notre Temps (Link1), a collection of pen and ink studies of Parisian street life by prolific illustrator Bertall, a picture of a roaming vendor who went from street to street offering to sharpen knives and scissors. The song/call he made as he wandered is below his picture, something like "Knives, Scissors Passing By." The article (it begins on p. 244) shows a number of street vendors and their associated songs, from cheese-sellers to glass merchants, each with an associated song or cadence.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125013853748
Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Fashionable Parisian Women
 
A small illustration from the 1906 L'Oncle de l'Europe (Link1), a collection of cartoons and illustrations depicting the era of Edward VII. This illustration shows a collection of fashionable French ladies, painted and corsetted, "elegant all the way to their manicured nails." No text, just an experiment with a different style -- and mood.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125009789161
Monday, April 28, 2014

Horrible Synchronicity
 
By coincidence, my graphic exploration of the University of Toronto's art card collection of 20th century Jewish-European historian Otto Schneid coincides with a United Nations holiday, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is celebrated today, an occasion to remember what Wikipedia calls the "6 million Jews, 1 million Gypsies (Roma and Sinti), [and] up to 9,000 homosexual men [killed] by the Nazi regime and its collaborators." From my point of view, I mourn the civility, lives, and culture destroyed under the thug narcissism of National Socialism. Casualties, according to Wikipedia, mounted to 2.5% of world population. I also mourn the soldiers on both sides (my father was one of them) and the German women brutalized by Soviet troops. Here is a 1927 painting called Hiob (Job) (Link1) by Lou Albert-Lasard, which seems to communicate the suffering and despair of wrong-headed war. See related images on April 8.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid21_2
Sunday, April 27, 2014

Bad Moon on the Rising
       
Turning again to the University of Toronto scans of the art card collection of 20th century Jewish-European Otto Schneid, a 1927 painting (Link1) by Lou Albert-Lasard showing in the foreground a nervous girl surrounded by two ambiguous figures on a city street distorted in the Expressionist manner. Albert-Lasard was a lover of German poet Rainer Maria Rilke. The second image shows what seems to be a 1934 classroom figure study by Leopold Gottlieb (Link2). The third image shows a stylish woman seated at a table, in a painting (Link3) by Feliks Frydman, who does not appear in any index of the time. The fourth image, also by Frydman, shows a woman lying down and is entitled, rather eplicitly, La Victime.
The series attempts to communicate my feelings given what we now know happened to the civilized and sophisticated people in Europe during the World War II years, when so many young women perished or suffered, between the concentration camps, the bombings, and the depradations of the various various invading armies.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid21_2
Link2 archive.org/details/ottoschneid15_22_24
Link3 archive.org/details/ottoschneid15_15
Saturday, April 26, 2014

Springtime Frolics in Hadrian Legend
 
From a 1921 newspaper photo of a two girls dancing in a Springtime Festival in France (Link1) superimposed on an engraving from the 1565 Hadriani Iunii medici Emblemat . Arnoldum Rosenbergum (Link2).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b53054894p
Link2 archive.org/details/81285178.4931.emory.edu
Thursday, April 24, 2014

The Lighthouse at the End of the World
 
Bundled along with another Jules Vernes story, this is an illustration from the 1905 Le Phare du bout du monde (Link1). It shows a lighthouse keeper lighting a fixed flame placed behind a Fresnel Lens.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6566970p
Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Strong Man and Gymnast
 
From the French public domain site Gallica, a collage of two 1921 photographs of members of the Cirque Molier: (1) strongman Léon Verhaert, stage name Hercules (Link1) and (2) young dancer/gymnast Lysiane Allarty (Link2).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b53067622g
Link2 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k10417215
Tuesday, April 22, 2014

Physiognomic Portrait
 
From the Flickr Collection of England's National Media Museum of West Yorkshire, an 1855 photo (Link1) by a doctor aimed at demonstrating some long-discredited theory that facial features are useful in identifying mental conditions. The woman is from an asylum in Surrey. Rather than diagnosis from facial expression, this portrait probably is best summed up by a commenter on Flickr: "A harassed woman in the wrong place at the wrong time." Around the edges, very faintly, are "emoticon" face icons from Rostros y emociones, a font by Rodrigo Gonzalez of Southype.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 flickr.com/photos/nationalmediamuseum/8408235610
Monday, April 21, 2014

Notes on the Road II
     
Settling in for first days in Hamtramck, more experimental crystal pictures from German crystal book (Linki1).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/atlasderkrystalltaf09gold
Saturday, April 19, 2014

Notes on the Road I

Luna Pier is a tiny city (pop. 1500) on Lake Erie, right off I-75 in Michigan. Ran across the city during my teenage wanderings from suburban Detroit and it has always fascinated me, for its brave little pier curving out onto the lake and its neat no-millionaire look. Here is an image memorializing this personally remarkable event: staying overnight, sipping a beer, in a beachfront town that has exerted a curious hold on me for 50 years. The font is Tobias Frere-Jones' Cafeteria Bold. The central image is a diagram of a crystal appearing in the 1913 Atlas der Krystallformen (Link1). Next to it, done at the same Luna Pier session, is one of the "art cards" showing the work of pre-Holocaust Jewish painters, from the collection of Otto Schneid at the University of Toronto. The painting of a woman's face is by T. Dikmen. The same crystalline structure shown in the first image is superimposed on this image, as well as two levels of fractalization (Link2).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/atlasderkrystalltaf09gold
Link2 archive.org/details/ottoschneid15_5
Friday, April 18, 2014

Rain-Delay Doodles
       
Various doodles, using fractal overlay on top of pictures from the 1904 Entwickelungsgeschichte der Modernen Kunst : Vergleichende Betrachtung der Bildenen Künste, als Beitrag zu Einer Neuen Aesthetik (Link1). From left: a William Morris print, a Latour engraving of the Rhine Maidens, a Courbet painting, and a Redon lithograph.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125012075673
Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Pattern of Rock Circles

A quote from artist Henri Matisse, displayed against a matrix of rock samples, from the 1918 Encyclopedia Americana (Link1). Again, use of fractal filter to add texture to the image.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/encyclopediaame34unkngoog
Monday, April 14, 2014

Change in Attitude

A personal thought, in Cafeteria Bold font, displayed against a pattern of linoleum samples from the 1930 Zenitherm for Walls and Floors trade catalog (Link1). I also used two online filters (Poster Edges and Fractalize) to add texture.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ZenithermForWallsAndFloors
Monday, April 14 , 2014

Encyclopedic Rabbits
 
From the 1918 Encyclopedia Americana (Link1), an illustration that accompanied the article on Rabbits, which reveals that some rabbits have ears that are 24 inches long. The font is Young and Beautiful, a new font by Misti Hammer. I used on online filter on a reduced-size image to get fractal color effect (on right). You can barely make out the huddled black shapes of the rabbits. Not sure I'm pleased with this use of the fractal effect, but am intrigued by the possibilities.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/encyclopediaame34unkngoog
Sunday, April 13, 2014

Fourth Day:Patriotic Dairy Scene

From the Finnish Museum of Photography, one of a series of photographs by I.K. Inha taken for the 1900 World's Fair. This one (Link1) shows three women working in a dairy, presumably making cheese. The text (in Cafeteria Bold) shows three sources of free online graphic filters I am experimenting with. Some others are:

• http://www.myimager.com/ ($1/mo)
• http://www.picfull.com/
• http://www.prodraw.net/online-tool/
• www.picmonkey.com ($2.75/mo)

Third Day: Composer's Widow

From the Finnish Museum of Photography, a photograph of Aino Sibelius, the widow of Romantic composer Jean Sibelius in the couple's country home in Ainola.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/valokuvataiteenmuseo/11064376754/
Saturday, April 12, 2014

Second Day

From a new contributor on the Flickr Commons, the Finnish Museum of Photography, a portion of a studio photograph (approx. 1910's) of Actress Elli Tompurl (Link1), dramatically lit and holding a crumpled letter.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/valokuvataiteenmuseo/11187909925/
Friday, April 11, 2014

Psychologically Significant Period Ahoy!
   
I don't know how to put it. Some combination of factors -- leaving the Co-op Board, Spring, vivid dreams, a sense of my lifetime running out -- has me feeling that the next two weeks are going to be BIG. Some realignment of self. Reboot. Bob 2.0. To signify this magical sense of looming significance, here's a calendar of those 15 days laid over an image. The image is composed of a picture of an orchid from the 1885 Lindenia: Iconographie des Orchidées (Link1). The orchid is laid over a grocery advertising illustration of a smiling boy from a 1939 The Australian Women's Weekly (Link2). The font is Calendar Normal by Thomas Harvey. Second version is a more print-friendly version. Third picture is the cover from the same issue of the the Australian women's weekly (Link2).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/HistoirenaturelIVGeof
Link2 archive.org/details/The_Australian_Womens_Weekly_30_12_1939
Thursday, April 10, 2014

More Applebaum/Apfelbaum Portraits

Attribution is uncertain, but these seem to be more portraits by Maurycy Applebaum from the small black-and-white cards in the University of Toronto Otto Schneid archives (Link1). What's odd is that if you Google Images under "Maurycy Applebaum" or "Maurycy Apfelbaum," the images that come up are considerably less interesting than these (in my opinion). Not sure what's going on. The framing device on right and left is a Native American ("babeen") pipe from the 1857 Pipes and tobacco: An Ethnographic Sketch (Link2). The font is Railway to Hells by ImageX, named after a rock and roll song by Blue Oyster Cult.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/ottoschneid14_4_5
Link2 archive.org/details/pipestobaccoethn00wils
Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Jewish Artists in the Holocaust

Recently, the University of Toronto uploaded scans of the archives of Otto Schneid, a European writer (1900-1974) who had the misfortune to start writing a scholarly study of 20th-century Jewish artists during the 1930's -- just as Adolf Hitler was coming to power. A study of Schneid by Barry Walfish is available as a PDF online. Schneid finally finished his monograph Die Juden und Die Kunst in Vienna in 1938, viewing it as an antidote to Hitler's traveling exhibitions of Jewish "degenerate" art. The book was ready for printing but the Nazis confiscated the plates. Schneid fled with just a suitcase to Poland, then Palestine, then Israel. He died in Toronto. One of the University of Toronto Schneid collections is titled Photographs and Cards of Art Before 1939 - Applebaum, Maurycy (Link1). Applebaum (sometimes spelled Apfelbaum, 1887-1931) apparently did these three paintings, casually photographed propped on chairs in black and white. I like them because they show daily life in a lost world of cosmopolitan European pre-war sophisticates. Clockwise from top left: a spirited young woman traveling on the road holds an amulet; three close friends put on headphones to listen to the latest radio news; and a couple share an intimate conversation. In context, there is a sad glamour here. The envelope in the lower left depicts a letter sent to Schneid in Tel Aviv from "Palestyn."
The font used here is Danny by the Polish font designers at Artcity.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 http://archive.org/details/ottoschneid14_4_5
Tuesday, April 8, 2014

19th Century Enthusiasm for Tobacco II

An illustration from an 1889 issue of the general-interest magazine Cope's Smoke Room (Link1), published by Cope Brothers, a Liverpool-based tobacco company that operated from 1848 to 1952. It is an illustration for an article on The Origin of Amber. The engraving illustrates the Greek legend in which young Phaethon lost control of the horses pulling the sun chariot and was killed by Zeus with a thunderbolt when the runaway sun threatened to burn up the earth. Phaethon's sisters "found [his] grave, over which they ceaselessly wept, unable to tear themselves away. At last the sisters took root in the ground, bark rapidly covered their bodies, their arms became boughs, and their hair leaves, and they were entirely changed into trees. Still the tears continued to flow, and these, hardened by the sun, became amber..." Overlaid on the engraving is a page from the classroom doodles of typographer Tom Murphy from his old web page. The font used here is >Metal Block Tango by Xerographer Fonts.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/pipeoftobaccowit00blan
Monday, April 7, 2014

19th Century Enthusiasm for Tobacco I

An illustration from the 1845 A Pipe of Tobacco: With Whiffs and Clouds (Link1), a book of poems, prose, and engravings dedicated to the pleasures of tobacco smoking. Among its claims, "Since 1586 [when Walter Raleigh introduced the plant in England], all our greatest discoveries and inventions have occurred, thus proving that smoking engenders thinking, and that great benefit to society must therefrom result." I suspect we'll see much the same enthusiasm when marijuana is finally legalized in this country, which has already happened in two states -- but not here. The font is Davis, by Divide by Zero. the nom de plume of Computer Science PhD student Tom Murphy.
Keen-eyed observers may have noted that the fonts I am experimenting with are all in alphabetical order. That's ecause I'm going through an old CD of shareware fonts. I think I will experiment with departing from that pattern and start finding new shareware fonts. These are more interesting because the websites of the designers display very street-wise (or should I say net-wide?) set of tastes.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/pipeoftobaccowit00blan
Monday, April 7, 2014

Peter Mattheisen

A quote from well-connected author and environmentalist Peter Mattheisen, who just died at the age of 86, after a year-long fight against leukemia. The words are from his book Snow Leopard. They are superimposed on a picture that appeared in the 1902 La Colonna del Cereo Pasquale di Gaeta: Contributo alla Storia dell'arte Medioevale (Link1). It is one in a series depicting the life of the Catholic saint Erasmus. From my weak grasp of Italian, I gather the picture is of either a Baptism or an Exorcism. (For a grisly depiction of the later martyrdom of Erasmus, allegedly by Arian heretics, see here). The font is Dark Crystal Script by Dennis Ludlow, which is based on the title script used in Jim Henson's animated movie, The Dark Crystal.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125013853862
Sunday, April 6, 2014

Game of Thrones

A line from George R.R. Martin's masterwork A Game of Thrones, spoken by the girl's "dancing master" or swordplay instructor. (See it here in the TV version.) The words are displayed against an engraving of a winter cabbage from the 1906 Germain Seed Company's 21st Annual Catalogue of Seeds & Plants (Link1). The black-and-white illustration is recolored by various computer techniques. The font is Crystal Radio Kit, modeled after the old Radio Shack logo by talented type designer Ray Larabie.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/21stannualcatalo1906germ
Saturday, April 5, 2014

Thoughts on Mortality

A line from an article in the latest London Review of Books, by author Geoff Dyer who says it's a line from Andrei Tarkovky's movie Solaris, based on the writings of Stanislaw Lem. The drawing of an angelic figure is from the 1902 La Colonna del Cereo Pasquale di Gaeta: Contributo alla Storia dell'arte Medioevale (Link1). The dragonfly and frog are from the 1844 Historia Fisica y Politica de Chile Segun Documentos Adquiridos en esta Republica durante doce Años de Residencia en ella y Publicada Bajo los Auspicios del Supremo Gobierno (Link2). The font is Cretino by Canadian designer Ray Larabie.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125013853862
Link2 archive.org/details/gri_33125014101840
Thursday, April 3, 2014

Democratic Legitimacy: On Sale by GOP

A political message, a quote from Justice Steven Breyer slamming the decision by the five Republican Supreme Court Justices, removing limits from campaign finance laws -- based on the argument that well-funded corporate propaganda campaigns are "free speech." The quote is placed over another composition of wooden decorative carvings from the trade catalog The Book of Carved Wood Decoration by Klise Manufacturing (Link1). The font is Cutting Corners by the prolific Aileen Lau.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/KliseManufacturingCoIncThebookofcarvedwooddecor0001
Thursday, April 3, 2014

iPad Selfie

A departure from the current series of public domain image + poetry selection + new font images. Here is a self-portrait in a local coffee shop, taken with a new iPad. It has minor distortion/finishing in iPad's Art Studio app, then further processing in Photoshop, PaintShop Pro, and Gimp on my computer. Had a busy time learning the iPad features. And I may not even keep the iPad -- I may pass it on to another artist I know.
Notice the unforgettable troll-like look I am cultivating for my eighth decade. What a saint Janice is to face this mug every morning! Considering promoting this image to head up this page and the Technical Notes page. The distorted image reflects my fear of death and aging.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
NA
Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Charles Wright on Divinity

The closing line from a poem by prize-winning poet Charles Wright on the Poetry Daily website. More lines from the poem, keyed on a traditional gospel song Just A Closer Walk with Thee:

But not too close, man, just not too close.
Between the divine and the divine
lies a lavish shadow...

Biblical Division of Labor
 
Two more images by Edward Burne-Jones from the book The Beginning of the World (Link1). The font is Colourbars, a "a swoopy headliner with a boyish slant," from Larabie Fonts. Canadian designer Ray Larabie lives in Japan and has a Facebook page.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 http://archive.org/details/gri_33125011094717
Monday, March 31, 2014

Dramatic Opening
 
In 1902, the Pre-Raphaelite painter Edward Burne-Jones did a series of twenty illustrations for a proposed -- but never finished -- biblical work. Later, they were published as The Beginning of the World (Link1). The first illustration in the series was keyed on the account of creation in Genesis:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

Collect Call & Water Works
 
Another combination work: a (1) selection from a poem, (2) a public domain image, and (3) a new font. Whew! The lines of poetry are from a poem called Collect Call by Ash Bowen, from a book of poetry called The Even Years of Marriage. (I ran across the poem on the Poetry Daily website.) The poetry is superimposed on a Philadelphia Library Company stereograph of the Fairmount Water Works (Link1). The font is ChunkoBlocko by the now defunct Omega Font Labs.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 /www.flickr.com/photos/library-company-of-philadelphia/9103348622/
Sunday, March 30, 2014

Darkness, Corset, and Confusion
 
Sometimes an artist just goes weird. Here, I take an image from the Philadelphia Library Company, a "trade card" advertising corsets (Link1), shown in the original at right. The text on the trade card says: "Adjustable duplex corset. The best corset in the world. Perfect in shape, and the most comfortable and durable corset known. Double bone, double steel, double seams. Warranted not to rip. Ask for it!" I then make it unrecognizable with various distortions, and finally overlay a selection of poetry from Imagist John Gould Fletcher. The lines are from the middle of a poem In the City of Night (Link2), dedicated by Fletcher to the memory of Edgar Allen Poe, published as the Poem of the Day from the Academy of American Poets. The poem's darkness and alienation resonates with a certain despair I have in community affairs. The font is Cherry Coke by Liverpool-based Future Fonts' Jonathan Edwards. .
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/library-company-of-philadelphia/6669221697/
Link2 www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/23936
Saturday, March 29, 2014

Decades-old Philadelphia Street Photo

Another group has joined the Flickr Commons, a local Philadelphia institution, The Library Company of Philadelphia. Its collection contains the work of Philly photographer John Frank Keith (1883-1947), who took street photos in South Philly and Kensington from about 1910 to 1940. Here is an undated silver-gelatin print (Link1) of two cheerful girls and their infant charge. I am still experimenting with Cheatin Regular font, difficult to read -- but it adds an interesting compositional element. This one says "Two Girls and a Baby." .
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/library-company-of-philadelphia/3636091413
Saturday, March 29, 2014

Tasmanian Artist

Again from the Tasmanian archives, there is a set of images from the Allport Family (family tree shown) who settled there in 1831. One of the Allports was Curzona, 1860-1949, shown on the right (Link1). Curzona, "determined to be an artist from an early age," moved with her mother to Europe to study Art and then returned to Tasmania. To the left is a 1926 linoleum cut by Curzona, showing a street scene in Hobart, Tasmania (Link2). Font is Cheatin Regular, a 1998 font by Matthew Welch.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/tasmanianarchiveandheritageoffice/8595612313
Link2 www.flickr.com/photos/tasmanianarchiveandheritageoffice/8537181755
Thursday, March 27, 2014

Children Waiting to Cross Street & Extinct Animal
 
There's a new public archive on the Flickr Commons: from the Australian island-state of Tasmania. Here, in a 1951 photo (Link1) used as teaching aide, a school crossing guard uses a long stick to hold back young children before they cross a road. The guard looks like an older schoolgirl; indeed in my youth, the older children were given safety patrol duties. Nowadays, around here, safety patrol guards are more likely to be paid adults wearing brightly colored vests. In this photo, the crossing guard wears the same white safety patrol belt that I wore. It reminds me of one of the most unpleasant experiences of my teaching days. A teacher fell ill and I was ordered to take over a class of second-graders for dismissal. One of the boys came up to me and held out a white belt and said he had to do safety patrol at the corner. I told him "No, sixth-graders do safety patrol, not second-graders," and I refused to let him leave. He cried and fought me. It turns out that he was right, his sixth-grade brother had entrusted him with the job. Always regretted that situation...
In other news, I have withdrawn my candidacy for a second three-yeadsr term on the Co-op Board of Directors.
Meanwhile, another image from Tasmania: the extinct wolf, last sighted in 1936 (Link2). Perhaps the wolf is eying the young safety patrol girl. Fonts are, respectively, CafeteriaBold and the 1998 Chonker font by Aileen Lau.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/tasmanianarchiveandheritageoffice/6980357040/
Link2www.flickr.com/photos/tasmanianarchiveandheritageoffice/7291813480
Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Dense Artistic Logjam, Big Decision
 
Very complicated (and huge) images with little compositional structure. Kind of stuck in an artistic rut, not sure what's going on. Also, making a big decision, whether or not to withdraw my candidacy for another 3-year term on the Co-op Board. Left image is heraldic shields from Diderot's 1762 Recueil de Planches, sur les Sciences, les Arts Libéraux, et les Arts Mechaniques: avec leur Explication (Link1) Second image is composition of illustrations of sets of dinner dishes, records, and pans being advertised in a 1925 Photoplay movie magazine. (Link2)

Later: Worked out compositional "solutions" to the two large, dense-pattern images, resizing them and adding clearly recognizable realistic elements from the same 1925 issue of Photoplay which produced the right-hand image: left, an advertisement for the home study art school that produced Charles Schulz and Mort Walker, and right, a young lingerie model, showing off "something new in glove silk underwear," specifically a vest and knickers.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 https://archive.org/details/RecueildeplanchIDide
Link2 archive.org/details/photoplayvolume22425chic
Saturday, March 22, 2014

Diderot Encyclopedia and Little Girl

"...She is not alone, though you see no one with her. But her eyes tell the tale; she is in the wake of some one, an elder sister or a rollicking brother, who stalks along leading the way. What pleasure equals that of strolling among the bushes, tall grass, and wild flowers in the early summer days, drinking deep draughts of pure air, laden with the scent of the apple and hawthorn blossoms!" This is the notation for the engraving of the painting Gathering Wildflowers in an 1889 Dominion Illustrated (Link1), a Canadian picture magazine, appearing in the bottom half of the composition. The top half of the picture shows diagrams of spiral stairways from one of the encyclopedic works of Denis Diderot, his 1762 Recueil de Planches, sur les Sciences, les Arts Libéraux, et les Arts Mechaniques: avec leur Explication (Link2).
For the font, I'm sticking with Tobias Frere-Jones' CafeteriaBold, which I am curious to see in different usages.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/dominion_illustrated_june1889
Link2 https://archive.org/details/RecueildeplanchIDide
Thursday, March 20, 2014

Sea Creature from German Encyclopedia
 
An illustration from an 1801 volume of Gottlieb Wilhelm's multivolume Unterhaltungen aus der Naturgeschichte (Link1), Translation: "Conversations on the Natural World." The creature is identified as #210 in the index at right -- but I can't quite read the old German blackletter font; Teufelsflaue?. Still, the series used the finest engravers from Augsburg, then the center of Europe's engraving trade. The words scattered about are just random words on my mind because I am learning how to use a sewing machine in order to enter the Plastic Club's Fiber, Fabric and Textiles show, with a deadline of March 29.
The font is CafeteriaBold (Link2), an early (1993) work by leading type designer Tobias Frere-Jones. Sadly, Frere-Jones is currently embroiled in a bitter business dispute with his partner in the "preeminent" type firm Hoeffler & Frere-Jones. The decorative dingbats around the edge are Cirkledingz(Link3) by Jakob Fischer, also known as Pizza Dude.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/unterhaltungenau21802wilh
Link2 www.fontbureau.com/fonts/Cafeteria/
Link3 www.fonts2u.com/cirkledingz.font
Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Mishap at Royal Masquerade

In 1393, the French court planned a piece of theatre to honor a court wedding. They took some linen body suits and used resinous pitch to cover them with hair-colored flax. "When they were all thus dressed, by having the coats sewed around them, they appeared like savages," explains the 1849 Chronicles of England, France, Spain and the Adjoining Countries (Link1), where this image appeared. Disaster followed when a member of the court grabbed a torch to more closely examine the "savages" -- and the pitch caught fire. By chance, the King, who was one of the "savages," survived.
The font is Bujardet Freres, by Michel Bujardet, who published his work under the name Match Fonts. Bujardet wrote: "This font is very precious to me, not only because that is one of the very first ones I created with Fontographer 3 (a while ago), but also because this character was used by my great uncles for their posters, at the 1900 Paris World Fair. Their company, Bujardet Frères, was selling enamel for the then flourishing furniture quarter, Saint Antoine, near Bastille."
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125008244739
Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Imperial Humiliation in Ancient Iran

From the 1882 The Seventh Great Oriental Monarchy: or, The Geography, History, and Antiquities of the Sassanian or New Persian Empire (Link1), a drawing captioned "Valerian Doing Homage to Cyriades" is in the center of this image. It shows the Roman Emperor Valerian the Elder, known for his persecution of Christians, who was captured in battle by the Persians.
One modern source explains:

"Valerian died in captivity either through execution or some other agent. Ancient sources claim Shapur humiliated the emperor. For example, the Persians used him as a stool to mount their steeds. After some time, Valerian attempted to pay a ransom for his freedom. In response, Shapur had the Roman flayed alive. Then, Valerian’s skin was stuffed and mounted. Years later, the Romans recaptured the macabre trophy and cremated it. Some modern scholars dispute the ancient sources. They claim that the ancients invented the grotesque death for propaganda purposes. Some used the story to attack the Persians. Others wished to demonstrate what happens to those that persecute Christians... Some modern researchers think Shapur sent Valerian to live in comfort befitting his station."

Ruined European Church Scenes
     
The French national archive recently uploaded scans of a 1915 French book La Guerre Allemande et le Catholicisme (Link1), a compilation of photographs of war damage edited by a French Cardinal This was back when World War One was apparently known (by the French) as "The German War." Some of the photos are excellent. Here are three of them. Consider them this baptized but "lapsed" Catholic's digital Easter Duty -- and St. Patrick's Day card.
Left: in a bombed-out church, the broken ("quartered") arms of a plaster Jesus dangle from the arms of a crucifix. The font is the 1999 BM-Fish Eye by Ben Nathan.
Center: From the same source, a dead man (the text labels him l'innocente victime and le cadavre carbonise) sprawled a few feet from a burned-out altar. Judging from his leggings, he may have been a soldier. The font is the 1999 Bogusflow, from Spork Plug Typography by Rev. Josh Wilhelm. (It's not clear what denomination the Rev. belongs to, but if you look at the comic strips on his blog, he is not all about angels and pearly gates, but is in touch with the dark side of life.)
Right: The Tabernacle -- the fixed, locked box on the altar in which the Holy Communion wafers considered to represent Christ are stored -- of a war-damaged and looted church. The text calls this picture Le Tabernacle Cambriole (or burgled). The font is the 1998 Brad by Mike Lecky, who is also known as Superfunk.
Using text again, which my fine-art friends may object to. Also, haven't mastered French accent marks yet.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k65829878
Sunday, March 16, 2014

Little Bo Peep Costume from Canadian Mining Town

Mountain Park has been an Alberta, Canada mining ghost town for half a century. Here's a 1920's photo from there labelled Girl in Costume (Link1). It is superimposed on a 1918 photo Athabasca River Flood (Link2). The type was released in 1984 and is called Bloody Font, by J. Fordyce.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 flickr.com/photos/alberta_archives/12241613175
Link1 www.flickr.com/photos/alberta_archives/10860919843/
Friday, March 14, 2014

Canadian Trading Post, Text Experiments

A picture (Link1) from the archives of the Province of Alberta, which recently joined Flickr Commons. Descriptive text is included in the image -- a big change, motivated mainly by frustration at gallery hangings that do not include text, but also by may fascination with typography. The font is Beethoven, a 2005 font by Canadian font-maker Daniel Gauthier. His page is here. Getting the type into the design was rough. Had to make an intermediate PDF from Photoshop, import that into InDesign, export the type into PDF, and re-import that into Photoshop. Ridiculously clumsy.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 flickr.com/photos/alberta_archives/10860322245/
Friday, March 14, 2014

Voluptuous Game Heroine and Avant-Garde Film Frames

Lower right, a figure of a female character in a 1993 Swedish role-playing game, Mutant Chronicles (Link1), a pen-and-paper game that went on to become a movie. The text is Swedish so I don't know her name, but I recognize that her ballooning bust and impossibly tiny waist makes her perfect for the 1993 teenage boy demographic. Images behind her are from a 1974 book Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde (Link2). True to the avant-garde nature of the material, it is difficult to describe what is going in the selected frames. One is from Larry Jordan's film Patricia Give Birth to A Dream by the Doorway, which shows a girl and a cat staring out a window and apparently shifts from the cat's view to the girl's view. Another film still is captioned: "Phantasmagoria within the Cultic Center" in Larry Jordan's film Sophie's Place.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/Mutant_Chronicles_Regler_-_Grundregler_Andra_utgavan_Mutant_Chronicles_-_Andra_Utgavan_Gothmog
Link2 archive.org/details/Visionary_Film_The_American_AvantGarde
Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Role-Playing Game & Eye Shadow

Elements in the center are from a "Gamebook" for a role-playing game, The Way of the Tiger 5: Warbringer (Link1), set on the imaginary world called Orb. Players make decisions and then follow alternate paths to determine the outcome of various political and military maneuvers. (I played four turns, and died because my avatar was horribly disfigured after I placed an emerald orb into my empty eye socket -- don't ask!) In pink, there are diagrams of the various ninja moves that are used in the game's military activities. In blue, there is a drawing of the "Boule," the governing body of the planet Orb. The frame is composed from an advertisement in the 2007 Seventeen Magazine (Link2), showing the various shades available in one brand of eye shadow. (I have always loved the pastel palette of women's makeup.) This is a weird, experimental image, impossible to decipher, and it may be headed for the Rejects page.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/The_Way_of_the_Tiger_5_Warbringer
Link2 archive.org/details/SeventeenMagazine2007-05
--> Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Homefront Cookery, Nails, and Porcelain Light Fixure

From a 1943 issue of Movie and Radio Guide Week (Link1), two pictures: (1) in a publicity photo, Hollywood actress Anne Shirley, in apron, cooks a turkey for Thanksgiving, and (2) scary-long nails an advertisement for Seal-Cote nail polish. Then, from a 1929 Pass & Seymour trade catalog, Porcelain and Electrical Supplies (Link2), a drawing of a wall lighting fixture, with stylized light rays. Stepping back from color, in this one, as well as texture.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/movie-and-radio-guide-1943-11
Link2 archive.org/details/PassSeymourIncPorcelainandedlectricalsupplies0001
Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Plumber Wicker Shower Bubbles

An illustration of a Master Plumber showing blueprints to a client, from American Standard's 1945 Plan Beauty For Your Home With American-Standard Plumbing Fixtures (Link1). In the background, a beaming woman revels among bubbles in her new shower, from the same catalog; and a wicker furniture setting, from a catalog by the Grand Central Wicker Shop (Link2). The catalog is undated, but the price of two wicker chairs, one wicker rocker, three seat cushions, and one 22-inch wicker table (shown in background) -- was $24.75. Their motto: "In Reed, We Lead." Texturizing is somewhat reduced in this piece.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/AmericanRadiatorStandardSanitaryCorpPlanbeauty0001
Link2 https://archive.org/details/GrandCentralWickerShopCatalog0001
Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Trenchcoat Girl in Fern Wood
   
A fashion photo from the 1975 Polish magazine Kobieta I Zycie (Link1) superimposed on a picture of ferns from a 1984 edition of the Pteridologist (Link2), and all again dimly superimposed on an unidentifiable patch from the 1877 Journal de Micrographie (Link3). The left hand version of the image contains my usual texturizing. The right hand version does not. I am considering lightening up on the texturizing...
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/KobietaIZycie23XI1975
Link2 archive.org/details/pteridologistbri5120brit
Link3 archive.org/details/journaldemicrogr1187unse
Monday, March 10, 2014

Polish Columnist and Sea Creatures
 
A photo of a columnist from 1975 edition of the Polish magazine Kobieta I Zycie (Link1) superimposed on a collage of strange and delicately-colored sea creatures from the 1791 Testacea Utriusque Siciliae eorumque Historia et Anatome Tabulis Aeneis Illustrata (Link2) Finally, superimposed on a plant illustration from the 1882 Field and Garden Crops of the North-western Provinces and Oudh (Link3). ... Need to do a pruning of this page soon, sending some images to the Rejects page .
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/KobietaIZycie23XI1975
Link2 archive.org/details/TestaceautriusqIVPoli
Link3 archive.org/details/fieldgardencrops03duth
Monday, March 10, 2014

Illumination and Mermaid Drowning Sailor
       
A page of examples from the 1861 The History, Theory, and Practice of Illuminating, showing illuminated letters from 13th century manuscripts. They are superimposed on barely visible image from the 1842 Book of British Ballads, illustrating a Scottish ballad telling how a handsome sailor was carried off by a mermaid and kept in a grotto beneath the sea until he escaped and returned to his home-town sweetheart. The sailor's struggles with the mermaid are shown in the center. The image on the left is my "artistic" image; these days I mainly concentrate on a luxuriant richness of texture. The third image is an intermediate stage of the treatment -- before I get into heavy texturizing; sometimes I wonder if I go too far and should stop at an earlier stage. The fourth image is a treatment of one of the illustrations from the ballad book.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/historytheorypra00tymm
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125012902363
Friday, March 7, 2014

Playing Card Queen on Ivory and Watermarks
   
From the 1870 The Arts in the Middle Ages, and at the Period of the Renaissance (Link1), the Queen of Hearts, a playing card design from 16th century, superimposed on a series of paper watermarks from old-time papermakers and a design from an ivory diptych. Presenting two versions: on the left, my usual textured version, on the right an untextured version. Not sure which one I prefer. Texturing requires twice the work.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 http://archive.org/details/gri_33125012263063
Friday, March 7, 2014

Medieval St. Catherine by Master of Dotted Background

All images from a single book, the 1870 The Arts in the Middle Ages, and at the Period of the Renaissance (Link1). It's a Getty Research Institute high-quality scan. Here, an engraving from the 16th century, of the martyr Catherine of Alexandria, done in an unusual style by someone sometimes called Bernard Milnet, sometimes called "The Master of Dotted Backgrounds." If you click on the image to enlarge it, you'll see this unusual and demanding style of woodblock carving -- breaking up the pure black ink areas with numerous white dots. This was before Albrecht Durer and other engravers perfected cross-hatching as a method of shading the pure black. The background is labeled "Paving Tiles of the 14th and 15th Century."
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 http://archive.org/details/gri_33125012263063
Thursday, March 6, 2014

Polish Surgeon on Mucha Deco and Chromatograph

Illustration from the cover of a 1969 edition of Wiejska Mlodziez (Link1), showing a Polish medical worker in surgical garb, working under operating room lights. I place this against the flowery background of one of Alphonse Mucha's ethereal beauties on a Gallica span of an 1898 poster by the printer F. Champenois (Link2). And then, behind that, the curious checkerboard of an illustration from the British Museum, from an 1864 book The Chromatographic Chronicle of English History (Link3). Encouraged by this image; the difference in method is that I determined to start out with some negative space.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/WiejskaMlodziez31969ZSRR
Link2 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b90051807
Link3 www.flickr.com/photos/britishlibrary/11066010656/in/set-72157638544764936
Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Another Three Treatments of Same Material
   
Going through considerable artistic angst these days.... Here, a combination of two images: a 19th century painting of a man's face, in a Warsaw museum, taken from a 1985 issue of the Polish Magazyn Polski (Link1). Next to it (or behind it) is a drawing panel from another Polish magazine, a 1969 edition of Wiejska Mlodziez. Two out of three of these images will be soon dispatched to the Rejects page.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/MagazynPolski31985
Link2 archive.org/details/WiejskaMlodziez31969ZSRR
Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Three Treatments of Same Material
   
Another threesome, combining the same two images images. The first is an old-style engraving from the 1791 L'Etruria Pittrice, Ovvero, Storia della Pittura Roscana, Dedotta dai Suoi Monumenti che Si Esibiscono in Stampa dal Secolo X (Link1), showing a winged angel holding a sword, banishing Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. The second element is an architectural fluorish from the 1568 Reigle Generalle d'Architectvre des Cinq Manieres de Colonnes (Link2). Not happy with the first two images, they will probably be dispatched to the Rejects page soon, but I like the third.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/gri_33125008688240
Link2 archive.org/details/gri_33125009314002
Sunday, March 2, 2014

Two Treatments of Same Material
nbsp;
Two combinations of the same three images. One image is a drawing from an advertisement in an early 20th century Italian aviation magazine (Link1), showing a Lynx Major engine from Armstrong Siddsley Motors of Coventry, England. The second image is a drawing of a log fence from the 1880 Rural School Architecture (Link1). The third image is a marblized endpaper from the 1791 L'Etruria Pittrice, Ovvero, Storia della Pittura Roscana, Dedotta dai Suoi Monumenti che Si Esibiscono in Stampa dal Secolo X (Link3).
Here are the originals:
   
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/xcollection1999
Link2 archive.org/details/RuralSchoolArchitecture
Link3 archive.org/details/gri_33125009314002
Saturday, March 1, 2014

Strong Man Hoists Wagon Wheel

From Gallica, a 1921 newspaper photograph Homme Tenant en Equilibre sur son Front une Roue de Charriot (Link1), showing a strong man balancing on his forehead a heavy wheel, before a crowd in a Parisian park. The white powdery area is a defect in the negative. The image is superimposed (empatterned) on an endpaper marblized pattern from the 1858 L'Art de Dompter les Chevaux (Link2) [Translation: The Art of Taming Horses].
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b53046649g
Link2 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6580037n
Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Shaggy Donkey in Title Page, Lightly Empatterned

A picture of a Poitu Donkey from the Gallica scan of the 1942 Chevaux de Culture, ânes, Mulets [Translation: Farm Horses, Asses and Mules, I think. The subtitle is Comment choisir et produire l'animal qui convient... comment utiliser votre cheval pour en tirer le plus longtemps possible le meilleur rendement which translates, I think, to "How to choose and breed draft animals, how to use your horse to carry a load the longest time possible at the best value."] (Link1). It is framed by a title page from another Gallica book, the 1895 Un Homme d'Oeuvres (Link2), and finally given a light patterning from an endpaper of the 1864 Les Trotteurs (Link3). Not pleased with result, it will probably be sent to the Rejects page soon, but the experiments with empatterning are useful -- and the little donkey sure was cute! I think I need a Poitu Donkey as a therapy animal to combat depression.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6579492r
Link2 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k65795515
Link3 gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k65794987
Tuesday, February 25, 2014

SciFi Collage and The First Hitchcock Blonde

In the foreground, an illustration from the 1958 science fiction novel Year When Stardust Fell (Link1) -- "A myserious fall-out paralyzes civilization". It is superimposed on a tiny detail of a pinup photo of Madeleine Carroll from the 1940 Movie and Radio Guide Week (Link2). Her eye is visible in the top center and her lips in the top right.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/Year_When_Stardust_Fell_1958.Winston_cape1736
Link2 archive.org/details/movie-and-radio-guide-1940-03-01
Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Shells and Early Dishwasher

One more, a background from the 1847 Thesaurus Conchyliorum, or, Monographs of genera of shells (Link1), and in the foreground a happy housewife from a 1926 brochure, The Kohler Electric Sink, shown finishing up the dishes washed by an early version of the electric dishwasher.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/thesaurusconchy11847sowe
Link2 archive.org/details/KohlerCoTheKohlerElectricSink0001
Saturday, February 22, 2014

Republishing the following from the 2013 www.philly-bob.net in honor of the massive Ukrainian street protests

FLASHBACK: Ukrainian Heroines
Illustrations from an 1878 children's book Maroussia: A Maid of the Ukraine (Link1), telling a Ukrainian legend. It is a charming story of a little girl who gives her life to rescue The Envoy, a George Washington-type national hero, during a period of political turmoil (when the Ukraine was invaded by Russia, and was considering whether to ally with Poland or go independent). In the first picture, the girl's mother does a masterful job of stalling Cossacks who want to arrest the Envoy, a guest at their house. One pistol-wielding Cossack breaks a window to demand that the mother open the door or he will burn the house down. Cunning, the fearless mother plays stupid -- Oh my goodness, I lost the key, I know it's in here somewhere. I'm so confused. Think Edith Bunker in All in the Family. The delaying tactic gives the Envoy time to escape. The little girl on the left, whose hand is being grasped by her mother, is the heroine Maroussia. After the Envoy is gone and mother lets the Cossacks in, Maroussia slips outside and leads the Envoy through the battle-scarred steppes to his destination. That journey, their adventures together, and the stories they tell each other, form the legend's key narrative. I'm reading the English translation.
In the second picture: during their journey, the plucky 11-year-old heroine hides the Envoy in an oxen wagon loaded with hay to smuggle the fugitive past the cossacks hunting him. But when the cossacks stop the wagon and begin to question her, quick-witted Maroussia charms her way out of it. The soldier guarding the wagon ask Maroussia where her parents are, but she turns it around, asking the soldier about his family, getting him to tell her about his own daughter, who is about the same age as Maroussia. Distracted, he doesn't search the wagon, doesn't find the Envoy hiding in the hay.
The third picture shows Maroussia and the Envoy arriving at a camp, their journey done.
After the Envoy is safely delivered, Maroussia is killed by a Tartar's stray bullet and is laid out on a funeral bier, where she is mourned by all. Not a dry eye in the house.
   
   

For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k65518515

Mountain Scene 'Empatterned' on Marblized Paper

Still continuing my experiments in melding foreground image with background pattern. Foreground image is an illustration an 1893 Sierra Club Bulletin (Link1), showing an Alaskan mountain chain. The background is a veiny marblized endpaper from the 1848 Zeitschrift der Deutschen Geologischen Gesellschaft (Link2). Scans are from the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/sierraclubb1119201922sier
Link2 archive.org/details/zeitschriftderd491897deut
Thursday, February 20, 2014

Leaf Beetle 'Empatterned' on Endpaper

Continuing my experiments in melding foreground image with background pattern. Foreground image is an illustration from the 1919 Coleoptera. Chrysomelidæ (Link1), showing one of the 35,000 species of leaf beetles. This one is called Agusta Formosa. The background is simply the swirling, faded end-paper from another book, the 1766 Hand-Buch oder kurze Anweisung wie man Naturalien-Sammlungen mit Nutzen betrachten soll (Link2). Fascinated lately by how the Photoshop "Reverse Image" command seems to take a wide palette of colors and condenses them into a narrower palette of blues -- which I find quite pleasing. The background here was produced by such a reversal. Also, added a date just below my logo. Scans are from the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 archive.org/details/coleopterachryso21919maul
Link2 archive.org/details/handbuchoderkurz00rudo
Wednesday, February 19, 2014

The World of Art, Taste and Beauty, Paris, 1923
 
The California State Library uploaded scans of the French fashion magazine Art Gout Beaute (Link1) to the Americana Collection of Internet Archives. The magazine is known popularly as "A.G.B." The background of the image on the left is a collage of various fabric patterns displayed in A.G.B.. The white image appearing several times in the foreground is an advertisement for a decorative comb -- not the simple toothed plastic comb of today, but more of a tiara, used to hold the hair in place. Part of it is shown alone at bottom left, and it is twice shown in use, above, with a woman in a sleeveless gown placing it in her piled hair. The image in the center uses another fabric pattern as a "frame" and a publicity photo of the Parisian singer and actress Mistinguett, inscribed (by her), "A.G.B. est le plus parisien des journaux des mode" (A.G.B. is the most Parisian of newspapers.) You can hear Mistinguett singing in 1928 here. A.G.B's Art Deco pages are pure eye-candy, like another French fashion magazine of a decade earlier Gazette du Bon Ton. The image on the far right, another combination of fabric pattern and an advertising illustration for a decorative comb, from a December 1922 issue of A.G.B.
There is a company that sell prints from this magazine commercially. (What's odd is that the illustration this company chooses to sell in the marketplace are entirely different from my selection of A.G.B. images.) The rich ladies with swan-like necks and willowy arms are a bit of a cliche, but the patterns and illustrations are often wonderful. The Art Deco style is what my generation of Boomers and Pre-Boomers displayed on dorm walls in our college days -- and the taste (gout) remains. Incidentally, there is a show at the Plastic Club called Small Worlds, limited to pieces no larger than 13" -- and I'm considering the left and far right images for my entry... Lazy wet/snow day today, never got out, and I'm avoiding the chore of learning how to use my new cell phone (a Google Nexus 5).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1 http://archive.org/details/artgoutmar1923unse
Saturday, February 15, 2014

Secrets Entrusted to a Few

For years, this drawing of an old book surrounded by early scientific instruments -- and a spiderweb -- appeared in advertisements for the Rosicrucians, advertising their book The Mastery of Life. This version is taken from a 1959 Galaxy science fiction magazine (Link1). The Rosicrucians are still around (see their current website) and the Mastery book is now available in PDF form. I know next to nothing about the subject -- but the esoteric traditions they teach are said to be drawn from Sufi and Freemasonry, two traditions I have some respect for. (My grandfather was a Mason.) In 2014 the Rosicrucians published their fourth manifesto (in four centuries) asking, sensibly, "How indeed can you want all human beings to be happy, without concerning yourself with the conservation of the planet on which they live?" and laying out a program of enlightened humanism -- not spiritualism. The original teachings may be a bit woo-woo for my taste, but the modern organization seems much more enlightened than I expected. I figure (with the Process Theologians) that religion and spirituality is an evolving human construct. The more we move away from selfish local dogmas, with bloodthirsty local gods, toward a concept of a Deity with loving concern for all of humanity, the better off we will be. In a way, it's like God, like life, is not changeless, but evolving.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/galaxymagazine-1959-12
Sunday, February 9, 2014

Eruption and Zodiac

From the French national Gallica site, the frontispiece illustration to the 1864 La Terre et Les Mers, ou Description Physique du Globe [Land and Water, or a Physical Description of the Globe](Link1). It shows, at bottom, a group of citizens gathered at a quay to watch the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, across a body of water. Superimposed on this image, at each corner, is a quarter of a compass globe showing zodiac signs, from the same volume. The purple tint is produced by my digital treatment.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k65769239
Saturday, February 8, 2014

Long Day for Reef Kincaid

Also from the Internet Archives Comics Collection, a collage of pictures from Centaur Comics' 1942 Amazing Man Comics #22 (Link1). Hero Reef Kincaid, an adventurer and soldier of fortune, takes his 40-foot schooner into a storm to investigate reports of a mysterious sea serpent. Hia boat is swamped and he is captured by the sea serpent, who drags him into the undersea kingdom of Atlantia. The emperor of Atlantia orders Kincaid's execution, but the emperor's beautiful daughter begs her father to spare his life. She gives Kincaid a tour of the city -- but her Atlantian fiance grows jealous and sets out to murder Kincaid. The story is marked "to be continued" -- but it never was.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/AmazingManComics022
Friday, February 7, 2014

Hazel of Hollywood

From the Internet Archives Comics Collection, a 1947 Ace Comic titled Four Favorites (Link1), the title frame for a Hazel of Hollywood story, showing a red-headed forties Hollywood bombshell and her studio executive boyfriend (with the pencil-thin mustache and zoot-suit). It's a trivial story in which a meddling fortune-teller threatens to break the pair up. The confident outline drawing is impressive.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/four-favorites-comics-32
Friday, February 7, 2014

Farm Daughter Announces Lunch

Last one from the Building Technology Heritage Library, the cover illustration of the 1942 Farm Idea Book (Link1). It shows a young girl in a gingham dress ringing a hand bell to announce the day's farm-lunch. In the background three or four farmworkers -- either family or hired hands -- look up hungrily from their chores, but the little dog on the porch beats them all inside. The Building Technology Library uses very high-resolution images; this one is 4964 x 5382 pixels!
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/JohnsManvilleTheFarmIdeaBook0001
Thursday, February 6, 2014

Four Glass Blocks

Again from the Building Technology Heritage Library, a composition of four decorative glass block patterns from the 1952 Pittsburgh-Corning Glass Blocks. The designs are, clockwise, from top left, Argus, Vue, Decora, and Argus Parallel Flutes.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/PittsburghCorningGlassBlocks0001
Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Housewives on Fences

Turning now to the Building Technology Heritage Library, an always entertaining a collection of housing plans and construction techniques, a housewife (or two) in dotted dresses stir a salad bowl, from a kitchen display in the 1942 Farm Idea Book (Link1). Their figures are displayed on a collage of suburban fences from the 1960 Modern Wood Fences (Link2).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/JohnsManvilleTheFarmIdeaBook0001
Link2: archive.org/details/WeyerhaeuserModernWoodFences0001
Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Texture from Dutch Surinamese Plant

Another one from the Biodiversity Heritage Library, the 1851 Dutch Stirpes Surinamenses Selectae (Link1) [Rough translation: Selected Plant Species from Surinam] has a large illustration of a plant called Phenakospermum Guianense, which grows "to over [32 feet] in height but can be felled with a single blow with a machete." This treatment takes the illustration and overlays three copies of it, blurring its structure and turning it into a texture -- with distortion added as a final touch. Its seed-pods can still be recognized in the top center. The history of Dutch Surinam is not a proud moment in Western European history; sugar and coffee plantations in the South American country were worked by brutally mistreated African slaves. Slavery was abolished in 1863.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/stirpessurinamen00miqu
Monday, February 3, 2014

The Dodo: Extinction's Poster Bird

From the Biodiversity Heritage Library, an unusual find. The 1907 Extinct Birds : An Attempt to Unite in One Volume a Short Account of Those Birds which have Become Extinct in Historical Times: That is, Within the Last Six or Seven Hundred Years (Link1) by Walter Rothschild, of the Rothschild banking family. Rothschild classifies the dodo as a pigeon, a judgement that survives today. The dodo became extinct around 1680-1690. Rothschild explains, "The causes of the extermination of this, perhaps the best known and most talked about of the recently extinct birds, are not far to seek. The total inability of flight, the heavy slow gait, and the utter fearlessness from long immunity from enemies, led to a continual slaughter for food by the sailors and others who came to and dwelt on Mauritius. But the final cause of the extermination of this and many other birds in the Mascarene Islands was probably the introduction of pigs, and also of the Ceylon Monkey. These animals increased enormously in numbers, ran wild in the woods, and soon destroyed all the eggs and young birds they could find." It's a beautifully printed book.
One wonders how a fabulously wealthy man like Rothschild was able to look around and see the importance of species extinction, while some current fat cats -- I'm thinking of you, Koch Brothers -- spend their money on policies that will only drive more species into extinction.
...In Florida, watching Denver get creamed in Super Bowl. Hope Peyton Manning can make the game exciting...
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/Extinctbirds00Roth
Sunday, February 2, 2014

Lady in Hat

From the Community Library of the Internet Archive, three images from a 1984 issue of the Polish magazine Plomyczek; in the deep background, a linked set of lines and circles in an article on winter sports; before that, an illustration for a children's story with a mitten and a bird; and in the foreground a bare-breasted woman with a hat and a come-hither look.
...Getting ready to leave for Florida trip. Moving a number of images into 2014 Rejects folder.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/Plomyczek11984
Friday, January 31, 2014

Cobalt Blue Monster

In the foreground, a Frankenstein organism created by assembling various drawings of animal parts in the 1838 Annals and Magazine of Natural History, Including Zoology, Botany, and Geology (Link1). The resulting chimerical critter (chimera: grotesque monster having disparate parts, especially as depicted in decorative art) is placed upon a blending of two pen-and-ink illustrations from the 1905 A History of Architecture on the Comparative Method (Link2), specifically one showing English Gothic architecture and showing the development of arches over the years. Originals were black and white, of course. Blue color was added in one manual step and then as a byproduct of various application of computer filters. Not sure how I feel about this one -- but it sure was fun assembling the pieces -- very relaxing as I got ready for a meeting.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: http://archive.org/details/s7annalsmagazine02londuoft
Link2: archive.org/details/historyofarchite00fletuoft
Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Witchy Woman

From another reprint of undated (probably early 20th-century) pulp edition of El libro de San Cipriano (Link1), a collection of magic spells, talismans, and amulets attributed -- almost certainly falsely -- to Saint Cyprian of Antioch (Turkey), a drawing of a woman on a throne surrounded by the tokens of magic. This is overlaid on a page from the 1905 A History of Architecture on the Comparative Method, showing British moldings (Link2). That is accented by one of August Lepere's decoration from the Huysmans book Against Nature (Link3). Signature included.
Sometimes people request seeing the originals -- the raw material -- I use in my "re-mixes". Here are the three described above:
   
I suspect that showing the source images detracts from the viewer's understanding of my work; it may be distracting.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/ellibrodesancipr00surf
Link2: archive.org/details/historyofarchite00fletuoft
Link3: archive.org/details/gri_33125012235582
Sunday, January 26, 2014

Photographer as Fool

The cover illustration from a 1900 photo catalog, The Art of Photographic Dodging (Link1), showing a photographer dressed in a fool's or harlequin costume. To his left, is one of the catalog's offerings, a celluloid floral border negative. The catalog is from Ilford Papers, a company still doing business supplying inkjet printer paper. The background is an image of a Roman triumphal parade, from a 1641 book, Splendore Dell'Antica e Moderna Roma, turned sideways. Haven't formed the habit yet of including my Signature Logo.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/gri_33125012911224
Link2: archive.org/details/gri_33125012900797
Sunday, January 26, 2014

Huysmans' 'Alluring Vileness of Debauchery'
   
Much of the story of Huysmans Against Nature (Link1) discussed in the last entry is literary and art criticism -- the aesthete protagonist, secluded in his country estate, ponders the relative virtues of writers and artists, ranging all the way from early Latin writers to the most fashionable Parisian painters of the day. One of his favorites was Gustave Moreau; Huysmans went on at great length about Moreau's Apparition, which shows Salome pointing to her vision of the bloody head of John the Baptist. My 2014 interpretation of Lepere's drawing of Salome is on the left; Augusgt Lepere's illustration for the 1913 edition of Against Nature is in the middle; Moreau's original 1876 painting is on the right (Link2). Huysmans wrote at length about Moreau's painting, finally concluding that in Moreau's interpretation, "Salome no longer sprang from biblical traditions, could no longer even be assimilated with the living image of Babylon, the royal Prostitute of the Apocalypse, garbed like her in jewels and purple, and painted like her; for she was not hurled by a fatidical [prophetic] power, by a supreme force, into the alluring vileness of debauchery." (This quote gives the flavor of Huysman's purple prose.) Moreau's painting was the subject of whole exhibition at the Hammer Museum at UCLA. Anyway, Huysmans' eccentric explorations would one day lead him to join a monastery -- quite a journey from decadence. My interpretation of Moreau's work (on the left) is placed upon a background composed of images from the 1891 Fruitland Nurseries Fruit Trees, Evergreens, Roses, etc. for Florida and Coast Belt of Southern States (Link3), specifically palms and roses.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/gri_33125012235582
Link2: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Apparition_by_Gustave_Moreau,_detail,_1876-1877_-_Fogg_Art_Museum_-_DSC02269.JPG
Link3: https://archive.org/details/fruittreesevergr1891frui
Sunday, January 26, 2014

Decadence Kills A Tortoise
 
This is a picture illustrating one of the weirdest anecdotes I've ever read. It's from a scan by Los Angeles' Getty Research Institute of the beautifully illustrated 1903A Rebours [Against Nature] (first published 1884) by J.K. Huysmans. The novel is considered the founding novel of the French Decadent Movement. Here's the anecdote illustrated above: this rich young man, enervated (and perhaps syphilitic) from the high life of Paris, moves to a secluded estate to indulge his exquisite sensibilities. He purchases a living tortoise and sends it to a jeweler, ordering him to coat the tortoise's shell in gold, cover it with a rich Oriental pattern, and encrust it with rare gems. The weight of these decorations crushes the tortoise to death. The aesthete notes the death, but expresses no remorse. WTF? The story seems to have something to do with a rebellion against Nauralism. A science fiction blogger offers a sophisticated analysis of the book. Illustrations in this edition are by August Lepere
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/gri_33125012235582
Sunday, January 26, 2014

Lighthouse Fixture
 
From a new addition to the Internet Archive list, École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées of Paris, a two-century-old Engineering institute: diagram of a rotating light from the 1842 Instruction sur L'Organisation et La Surveillance du Service des Phares [Lighthouses] et des Fanaux [Lights] des Côtes de France displayed against the interesting pattern found on the report's binding. Note that for the first time, I am including my personal signature/logo in the lower right hand corner.
Put together my five-work submission (by invitation) at the Bob Jackson Gallery in the basement of the Plastic Club. Here's my listing of works.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/ENPC02_OUV_8_6636_C389_1842
Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Truck Camouflage
 
Again from a government documents collection, here is a crude diagram to train troops to paint a truck in camouflage, from the 1942 mimeographed book Camouflage Training Manual For The Air Service Command (Link1). It is superimposed on a modern camouflage pattern, barely recognizable, the Chinese People's Liberation Army Type-99 (Link2) pattern.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: http://archive.org/details/CamouflageTrainingManual
Link1: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_99_%28camouflage%29
Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Mechanical Drawing
 
Turning to government documents, most of which are in the public domain, here is a diagram from the Bureau of Indian (New Delhi) Standards' 2013 IS 629: Bicycle Hub Assembly, which revises the requirements for building bicycle parts (Link1). I like the technical drawing style; as a young man, my father spent a summer as a pen-and-ink draftsman, drawing plans for a gas station. I took the bicycle hub picture through my usual processing, but then added a polar distortion. I enjoy these highly abstract images, which are very relaxing to work on, with no documentary constraints -- the sky's the limit. Or should I say the imagination is the limit. The background includes another copy of the diagram reversed out and a pattern from a marblized paper book binding, source not recorded.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/gov.in.is.629.2013
Monday, January 20, 2014

Horrors of World War I
   
World War I was an awful event. It changed the direction of European culture -- in my view, for the worse. This was 100 years ago, and given copyright law, some sources are just coming into the public domain. Here, from the French national site Gallica, is an illustration from a 1917 illustrated manuscript by Marcel Roche (1890-1959), memorializing his experiences on one day of battle. It is titled 22 Août 1914: Le Combat du Grand-Bailly. Roche wrote and did the illustrations in gouache. He had a friend do calligraphy for the text. The first illustration shows some monstrous imaginary creature reaching out its arms to consume fallen soldiers dressed in the red and blue uniforms of the French army. Roche himself was wounded in that battle. The second illustration shows some poor soul who was apparently killed by a sniper bullet to the head while he was relaxing with a cigar.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k990536v
Saturday, January 18, 2014

Rhine Maidens and an Ugly Dwarf
 
The New York Public Library recently uploaded to the Internet Archive a scanned copy of the 1910 The Rhinegold & the Valkyrie, the librettos of two operas (Link1): Das Rheingold and the Valkyrie, written by Richard Wagner, lavishly illustrated by Arthur Rackham. On the left, an illustration showing the Rhine Maidens, three mermaid-like creatures charged by the Norse Gods with protecting a magic hoard of gold hidden under the Rhine River; the gold can be used to make a ring "which measureless power imparts." The gold is also protected by a spell that say "Only the man who love defies/ Only the man from love who flies/ can learn and master the magic/ that makes a ring of the gold." One day, the three beauties are swimming about, when they come upon Alberich, an ugly, horny dwarf who happens to pass by. The dwarf is entranced by their beauty and woos one after another to their cruel amusement. Finally, frustrated by their seductive tease and the way they elude his grasp, he renounces love and women forever. This fulfills the prophecy that the gold can only be taken by someone who renounces love. Alberich then steals the gold, setting the complex plot in motion. The picture to its right shows Alberich being chased by one of the water sprites as he dives to his cave hideout.
See a 12-minute stretch of the operatic staging at Bayreuth and a 16-minute stretch from the Metropolitan Opera (the action starts after a 7-minute overture).
As an old man with unkempt hair and beard, from whom all trace of youthful beauty has flown, I sympathize with Alberich, the "amorous imp" -- especially living as I do in the Rittenhouse Square/University of Pennsylvania neighborhood, where there are so many beautiful young women.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: http://archive.org/details/rhinegoldvalkyri00wagn
Saturday, January 18, 2014

Polish Transport 1958
   
The Internet Archive's scans of the Library of Congress' "X-Collection" -- a now-obsolete collection of miscellaneous boxes full of pamphlets and brochures -- includes two 1958 course catalogues from the Polish Railway Institute (Link1). One cover show a freight locomotive, the other shows a pair of truck tires, rendered in an assured, but abstracted, pen-and-ink style. My Art Club has an upcoming show devoted to Travel and Transport with a delivery deadline of Jan. 24-25. Will this combination of the two drawings be my entry? Putting this here to start thinking about it. I want to improve my framing technique -- previously I just mounted pictures on foam-kore in dorm poster fashion. So I bought two IKEA frames with an inside-mat display size of 15.25" x 19.25" and a unmatted display size of 19.75" x 27.5", but I'm afraid these size constraints led me to make some bad design decisions on this one. I did another version, on the right, with a map (Link2) of a recently opened European Dark-sky preserve in the background.
Besides this open show -- which is optional -- I've also been invited to submit five works to exhibit in the Club's Downstairs Gallery. It's exciting, but I'll be a busy boy in the weeks ahead. Another looming deadline: Feb. 14 for a decision on whether to run for the Co-op Board again.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/xcollection2207B
Link1: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Boto-mapa-big.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Boto-mapa-big.jpg
Friday/Saturday, January 17-18, 2014

Eisenstein Drawing and Mathematical Graph
 
Another Hamid Naderi Yeganeh graph (Link1) from the Aesthetic Appeal collection on Internet Archive. I don't include the equation that produced the graph; it's at the source. Yeganeh's image serves as background for a sketch by Russian film director Sergei Eisenstein's 1959 Notes of a Film Director (Link2). The quick gestural drawing titled "Tragedy" shows a man on his knees howling with heartbreak as he grasps the waist of an aloof, uncaring woman. The book is from the American Public Domain collection. The sketches Eisenstein made for his movies' costumes, scenes, and setting are in the book, showing his quick, direct, fluid drawing style.
Made another version of the picture, on the right, attempting to subdue the rainbow chart.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/8g5sj6f9
Link2: archive.org/details/notesoffilmdirec00eise
Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Romanian Fata and Mathematical Equation
 
Another combination of two images from two collections. The background of this image comes from the Aesthetic Appeal collection on Internet Archive, which is Iranian computer scientist Hamid Naderi Yeganeh's selection of what he considers the most visually appealing graphs created by his software. Here, a detail of the graph of the equation on the right. The graph is used as a "frame" for a picture from the Flickr Commons Costica Acsinte collection of photographs taken by Costica Acsinte, who ran a photo studio in Romania between 1897 and 1984. The collection notes that the woman's name is Fata.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/727vhn62
Link2: www.flickr.com/photos/costicaacsinte/11654700095/
Monday, January 13, 2014

Revolution Arts Model II

A combination of two images from two collections. From the Building Technology Heritage Library, a collage of different-sized steam and hot-water radiators from Harris Brothers' 1924 Catalog of building supplies (Link1). The catalog copy extolls the radiators' "plain design, without old-fashioned ornamentation which covered imperfect careless castings." I remember painting old radiators in various rented apartments during my student days, and there was something sad about the fancy designs covered by half a century of sloppy paint jobs. The radiator piece is background for an image from the Community Library 2012 edition of Revolution Arts magazine (Link2): one of model and photographer Lauri Garcia Jones' photos from a set of pictures that seem to show people after some unspecified disaster. (Incidentally, Ms. Jones graciously responded to my January 10 query and agreed to my use of her pictures as long as I included "original credit" -- and spelled her name correctly).

Revolution Arts Models I
 
One of the pleasures of exploring the Internet Archive Community Library collection is a slick, high-production-value online magazine called Revolution Arts, here the 2012 edition #34 (Link1). One of their features is Revolution Arts Models, "a showcase for photographers, models, make up artists and fashion designers." Pix of pretty young women like in the fashion magazines, sure -- but since these are the models themselves offering their portfolios, there is room for individuality. Each Revolution Arts portfolio includes website information, so you can find out about the model. Here, for instance, is a picture from the online portfolio of Lauri Garcia Jones, a Texas model and photographer who offered up a set of pictures that seem to be set in some post-apocalyptic after-the-disaster world. Jones is a mother of three and a part of the San Antonio art scene. She also participated in presenting the poster on the right (Link2)-- the very antithesis of the typical "pretty young woman" esthetic.
Note: Since Ms. Jones is presumably still working and selling her photographs, I contacted her using her website's "Contact Me" form and asked permission to use her work in this way. She graciously responded, giving me permission as long as I provided her name for "original credit" -- and spelled it right, which I didn't do the first time.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/revolutionart_issue_34
Link2: laurigarciajones.wordpress.com/page/2/
Friday, January 10, 2014

Lysergic Acid (LSD) Cookbook

Again from the Internet ArchiveCommunity Library collection, the cover illustration to the Book of Acid: Easy to Follow Instructions for Making Organic LSD from Legal and Available Materials, a 1975 manual to making the hallucinogenic LSD-25 from the seeds of various plants (Morning Glory or Baby Hawaiian Wood Rose) or from various molds and fungi. The cover shows a drawing of morning glory vines and laboratory apparatus. A note in the Internet Archive entry says "The organic reactions in this book are quite dangerous so, for the novice please do not attempt it."
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/BookOfAcid
Thursday, January 9, 2014

Early L.Ron Hubbard Cover

Turning now the Community Library, a much wilder and diverse library, I find a cover of one of L. Ron Hubbard's early science fiction works, a novella called Fear, first published in a magazine in 1940 and later (1954) reprinted in book form.. Hubbard went on to form Scientology, a scary organization (in my opinion).
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/Galaxy_Novel_Number_29_Fear_
Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Boat Passes Chinese Landscape

From the Internet Archive Universal Library collection, an illustration from a Chinese book. The book is titled, in Chinese, ????????????(???), which my Chinese-to-English translator gives as "Mr. Wu criticized Mr LEE Cheuk-yi Outlaws of the Marsh (32)" (Link1). Probably something more like Outlaws of the Marsh, a suitable title for a pulp best-seller in any society. What I like about this image is the sense of slow, downstream drifting of the boat (even with two oarsmen). I also like the landscape it passes -- a small village with a bridge, a riverside road, and then an impossible configuration of hills and trees beyond. I've never been to China, but can such landscapes really be? The book was scanned and donated by the China-US Million Book Digital Library Project. Size at 150 pixels-per-inch is 9.8" wide x 14.8" high.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/02111804.cn
Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Butterfly & Constructive Anatomy

White figures in the foreground are a pair of torsos (top) and a clenched fist (bottom) from George Bridgman's 1920 book of drawing techniques, Constructive Anatomy (Link1). Those are placed over three copies of a drawing of an Atis Butterfly from the 1832 The Book of Butterflies, Sphinxes and Moths. ...
Opening went well. No sales.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/constructiveanat00briduoft
Link2: archive.org/details/bookofbutterflie01browuoft
Monday, January 6, 2014

Cover of Spanish Book of Spells

From the Internet Archive Canadian library collection, the cover of an undated (probably early 20th-century) pulp edition of El libro de San Cipriano (Link1), a collection of magic spells, talismans, and amulets attributed -- almost certainly falsely -- to Saint Cyprian of Antioch (Turkey), the pagan sorcerer who attempted to seduce the Christian virgin Justina but instead was converted to Christianity. The two were tortured and martyred by Diocletian. The first known edition appeared in 1849; this scan is from the University of Toronto. Much woo-woo about this book. Some bookstores keep it chained in a box. Legend has it that if you read the book from back to front, the devil will appear. Anyway, this cover pretty much has all the elements for a popular best-seller: a curvaceous damsel in a blue dress being burned by a red-skinned devil while a white-haired monk prays and two infernal creatures stand by. Or something like that. I don't believe in any of it -- but you won't catch me reading it from back to front because the human mind (including my own Skeptical Humanist brain) is so suggestible to these old, old scare stories.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/ellibrodesancipr00surf
Saturday, January 4, 2014

Starfish, Dancers, Chicken
 
Switching over to Internet Archives Americana text collection, I put together a drawing of the head of a chicken from the 1921 Book of Poultry (Link1), superimposed on an image of seafloor starfish from a 2004 issue of Novapex, a Belgian magazine on mollusks and seashells (Link2). At top and bottom are dancing figures from a 1994 symbol font called DANCEMAN.
For maximum effect with my images, click on the image until it is full-size, which may be larger than your computer screen.
Sources:
Link1: archive.org/details/bookofpoultry00mcgr
Link2: archive.org/details/novapextrimestri52soci
Wednesday, January 1, 2014

To contact Philly-Bob, email me at admin [at symbol] philly-bob.net (of course, replace "[at symbol]" with "@"]. Be patient. I only check that address once a month.