Calling

... an Elgin marble from a waking dream

Would it not be a marvel
to find your calling—your niche—
to be suffering
(emptily, on empty)
draped over
a marvellous throne
where everyone feels
envy, breathlessly
(superficially)?

Dornröschen (Sleeping Beauty) by Louis Sussmann-Hellborn, 1878, via Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin, Germany

Antoine’s Women; Rosalba’s Muse

“Watteau’s women do not care to represent Womanhood or Love or Beauty, certainly not with a capital W or L or B. They are not the sort of women who want to be regarded as forces of nature. They are not interested in being idealized or idolized. They are too much at ease to be caught up in such fantasies.

They stand apart from their own beauty and their amorous adventures, as if they felt free to consider the value of love or beauty, but only the value it might have for them, for now—a private matter. They are in some sense natural aristocrats, with a freedom from social constraints that gives them the aura of supernatural beings, even of goddesses.

But Watteau’s women are not goddesses in any classical sense. They have none of the traditional responsibilities of goddesses. They do not personify some value or virtue. They do not have supernatural powers. And that is precisely their charm, the key to their comic exuberance. They are goddesses who are freed from all responsibility. They are goddesses who have resigned from their roles.

They are goddesses on the lam.”

～Jed Perl, Antoine’s Alphabet: Watteau and His World

A Muse, by Rosalba Carriera, Italian, about 1725,
pastel on laid blue paper, 12 3/16 x 10 1/4 in., via The Getty Museum.

Portrait of Archduchess Maria Isabella, from The History of Florence: From 59 B.C. to 1966: the two-thousand-year story of a unique city, whose way of life has influenced the world, by Marcello Vannucci.

Lady Beatrice, by George Clausen

Combing Hair, by Torii Kotondo (Japanese, 1900-1976). Japan, Oct 1929.
Prints; woodcuts. Color woodblock print; embossed.
Image: 16 1/8 x 10 5/16 in. (41 x 26.2cm);
Sheet: 18 9/16 x 11 3/4in. (47.2 x 29.8cm)

Mirror (Kagemi), by 恩地孝四郎 Onchi Koshiro (Japanese, 1891-1955), ca. 1930, 
woodblock print with gofun and mica, 33 x 23.1cm

“Forget this world and all its troubles and if possible
its multitudinous Charlatans—everything in short but
the Enchantress of Numbers.” 
～Charles Babbage to Ada Lovelace  

*Portrait (detail) of Ada by British painter Margaret Sarah Carpenter (1836).

Con la rosa tra le labbra, 1895, by Ettore Tito (Italian 1859-1941).

Portrait of Countess Elisa Dadiani, by Savelij Abramovich Sorin, 1919 (via)

Nayika Shringara: the romantic herione adorns herself, preparing her hair. 

Jodhpur, circa 1830 (artist unknown). Gouache & gold on paper. 15 x 10.3cm. 

*via Indian Miniature Paintings

Ideal Female Heads, French, 1769-1770,

by Jacques Augustin Pajou (1730-1809),

Terracotta on white marble socle, via The Getty Museum.

Detail of Bacchante tenant un tambour de basque, avec deux enfants 
(Bacchante holding a tambourine, with two children),
by Jacques Augustin Pajou (1730-1809); Marble, Musée du Louvre.

Three Studies of a Woman and a Study of Her Hand Holding a Fan, 
by Antoine Watteau c.1717

Detail of a Female Nude Study, by George Lawrence Bulleid (British 1858-1933).

Vioets, Sweet Violets (detail), 1906, by John William Godward

When the Heart is Young (detail), 1902, by John William Godward. 

Oil on canvas, private collection

Jacques-Louis David, Psyché Abandonnée (detail), 1795, Musée du Louvre

Empress Elisabeth of Austria, 1864, by Franz Xaver Winterhalter

Helene Caroline Therese, Duchess in Bavaria (4 April 1834 – 16 May 1890) 
of the House of Wittelsbach, nicknamed Néné, was a Bavarian princess and, 
through marriage, temporarily the head of the Thurn and Taxis family.

Hands

In celebration of my infatuation with hands, I have compiled some photographs which I find infinitely beautiful and mesmerising. As a pianist and lover of Chinese opera, hands are to me the most sensual, mysterious and magical part of a human body. They are also the most “narrative.”

Stephen Deutch: Potter's Hands, Vintage Gravure

Rudolf Koppitz (1884-1936), Hand Studie, ca. 1920, Bromoil print (image via)

my hands

吻。

The tree from whose flower

This perfume comes

Is unknowable.

～Matsuo Basho (1644-1694)

A sculpture at the Musée Rodin, Paris, France. (*via)

Pierre Choumoff, The Hand of God in bronze at the Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh
La Main de Dieu [by Rodin], c.1915, silver gelatin print (c.1915)

“When the spirit flows from the hands, it is called 'labour.' From nothing, the hands start to create wonderful works of art. The hands are the exit of the spirit. The movement of the hands embodies human longings and human beings are formed by the work of the hands. The hands create forms that never existed before, and this art of creation is uniquely human. That is, human hands carve an image of the individual out of vacant space. Humans recognise the level of their own spirit by looking at what they have created with their hands. That is, the hands enable the spirit to emerge as works of art, and it will reflect what is in your heart. As a result, what is in your heart shows in your work, and the hands will reflect what level you are, sometimes joyfully, sometimes sadly.” 

～Late Master in Japanese embroidery, Iwao Saito

  

“Female hands” Anna Penagini, by Emilio Sommariva, 1935

Takamatsu Jiro, Shadow No. 1413 (*image via)

“From within this giant junkyard where all things are corroding and crumbling, what will capture us, pull us up, flush us out, rescue us from our bloated languidity, will never be these things themselves. It can only and always be found in the faint light of the world to come, in possibility, or probability, indeterminacy, lack, and all the others that only ‘are' in absence.” ～Takamatsu Jiro, 1964

How To Sleep: With forearm tensed, model shows relaxed way of dropping hand, 

by Gjon Mili, New York, 1943

How To Sleep: With forearm tensed model shows tense way of dropping hand, 

by Gjon Mili, New York, 1943

梅蘭芳手指尖上的傾國傾城 {via}

Hand Gestures of the Legendary Peking Opera Master Mei Lanfang 

(Mr. "Poetic Oneirism")

梅蘭芳手指尖上的傾國傾城 {via}

Hand Gestures of the Legendary Peking Opera Master Mei Lanfang 

(Mr. "Poetic Oneirism")

“蘭花指”之擺手式

Hand Gesture "Orchid Fingers" in Chinese Opera

Mei Lanfang's Hand Gestuality in Beijing (Peking) Opera

Book Negs, Casals, by Gjon Mili

Hand of Bassist Red Callender During Filming of Jammin' the Blues, by Gjon Mili

Pianist Clara Haskil's Hands {unknown image source}

Josef Hofmann's Hands in Action, by Gjon Mili, 1940

Film Still from "Late Spring" directed by Ozu Yasujiro

Hand of cellist Gregor Piatigorsky whilst playing Schubert

{film still via YouTube}

Jam Session: Hand of unident, bass player on the strings during jam session at photographer Gjon Mili's studio, by Gjon Mili, New York, 1943

Deborah Turbeville

The Graceful Hands of Ballerina Tilly Losch, by E. O. Hoppe, 1928 {via}

Close-up of woman's graceful hands (old print), by E. O. Hoppe, 

United Kingdom, 1925

Close-up of woman's graceful hands (old print), by E. O. Hoppe, 

United Kingdom, 1925

Sinuous and sensitive hands of artist Blair Leighton, by E. O. Hoppe, 

United Kingdom, 1920

Close-up of a woman's graceful hands with ring and necklace in foreground (old print), by E. O. Hoppe, United Kingdom, 1925

Tango {unknown image source}

Stroboscopic image of the hands of Russian conductor Efram Kurtz whilst conducting, by Gjon Mili

The Baton, by Gjon Mili

中國戲曲之手勢“蘭花指”

Various Hand Gestures of "Orchid Fingers" in Chinese Opera

Hands of Bresson: a visual essay on the tactile world of Robert Bresson created for the Criterion Collection, by kogonada. Music: Schubert, Piano Sonata No. 20, D. 959 (Au Hasard Balthazar).

Nicolas de Largillière (1656 – 1746), Portrait of a Woman, 1696 (detail)

Good Luck to My Friend, via coeXist

Svetlana Zakharova's hands in "La Fille du Pharaon"

The Grand coda from La Fille du Pharaon:

Kim Yu-Na's hands in "Bond Girl," 2009

*Also watch Kim Yu-Na in her stunning long programme Scheherezade (2009 Figure Skating World Championships), a magical firebird on ice.


*All Gjon Mili and E. O. Hoppe images via the LIFE photo archive hosted by Google
**Thank you Photography Influences and Couleurs for introductions to Gjon Mili's How to Sleep photo and E. O. Hoppe's Close-up of woman's graceful hands respectively.