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Photo Collage – Blaming it on the Blog!

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  Okay, please know that I am officially blaming my acquisition of photo collages on this blog. I really wasn’t collecting them, but I started thinking about them after the first post – and now I find myself sliding over to look at them on eBay – and occasionally getting hooked on one, hence the recent acquisition above. Seems to have been made as a bookmark, judging from size and shape.  I just find it earnest and charming, and decided to save it from isolated obscurity by adding it to my merry band of photos.  Much like the one I posted on August 8, Flapper Page – Photo Album, I imagine a young girl, entertained by the availability of inexpensive photos having a high old time with scissors and a pot of glue. Despite what I was told in Art History 101, collage was clearly alive and well long before Picasso and Braque – let alone Dada!

Lucky Black Cat

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  British swimmer, Ruthley Moris-Hancock, ’36 Olympics, holding her good luck stuffed kitty. This photo from the Olympia 1936 German, Cigaretten-Bilderdienst Altona-Bahrenfeld photo album. A quick google search reveals that this is an often reproduced image on posters and things. Who knew? However, reminded me very much of my post of a week or so ago – Cat Hat, see August 9. Dolly and Ruthley share a fashion and good luck talisman statement, although Ruthley’s came more than a decade later – showing the durability of the black cat. Frankly, couldn’t find out much about Ruthley online – this may be her most distinguished moment. Below I have included the back of the card, for the German readers in the group.

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Felix on Parade

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  As you can see it isn’t like the Brits and the Aussie’s had this Felix thing all sewn up! Here are two photos of Felix parade floats in the US.  One is a photo postcard (Oregon Laundry) and the other is a tiny snapshot. On top, the Rose Festival in Portland, OR,’29 – man, they could do my laundry any day! My hat’s off to the fine people of Portland, OR which seems, oddly, to be a hotbed of Felix photo activity. Go Portland!

The snapshot, identified as the Bamberger’s Parade, Thanksgiving, ’31. Presumably this is Newark, NJ – a fine little home movie color film snippet, Bamberger’s Thanksgiving Parade circa 1933,  is absolutely worth the four and a half minutes on NJ.com and suffering through the commercial at the beginning.  Felix doesn’t show up, but Mickey puts in a very brief appearance. An indication that perhaps by ’33 or so Felix’s star was starting to fade a bit in the USA, and Mickey was the big kid on the block now. Mickey parade photos to follow in the future!

Moon Photo

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post:  Allie, This is you and Lonnie, isn’t it?  I love photos of people posing on the moon! While this is a pro card (special for Valentine’s Day evidently) I have a few choice examples I will follow-up with some of the photo studio ones – I have one in my office I am especially pleased with.  I continue to search for an opportunity to have my photo taken on one. I love just sorting through them on eBay and looking at all the different ones.  They could be their own book.

The French took the moon postcard into a whole different realm – naked women, even cats – all sorts of variations. I am less fond of these, preferring the unexpected and unique ones taken at fairs and seaside resorts, but some are quite wonderful. I look forward to organizing these into their own section and sharing more of them.

Flapper Page – Photo Album Continued

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Shortly after my cat photo collage post (August 10) I found this interesting page on eBay and decided to stretch a point and buy it – no cats, but a sort of wonderful glimpse into what was likely a young woman’s life in the twenties. It is a small page, less than 8×10 – so each image is quite tiny. I am wondering which, if any, might be the owner of the album and page maker – maybe the girl with the fur collar and pearls at the top in the middle? Or the one with the hat above her? Blurry photos were not beneath use in their place, see lower left – and the line of legs and shoes at the bottom is what really does it for me. Were these showing off the new shorter skirts of the day? Or just the fashionable shoes – or both?

When I posted the other one someone speculated on how attempts at making contemporary collages never have the same charm. I tend to agree, although I think it is more difficult than it looks and you need a good eye for it. I also believe that there’s something to it being a less cynical time – no striving for irony and a sense of real wonder and fun with the availability of the new medium of photography.

(I just realized that you can’t blow this up unless you drag it to your desktop – please do and have a good look!)

Felix Mask-a-rama

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Pam Pictorama Photo Post:  There are times when you really do wish you knew what the heck was going on in a photo and this is one of them – although the speculation is entertaining too.  Halcyon days of the past when people got together and all dressed up like Felix.  (Over time I have come to realize that this was much more common with Mickey Mouse masks – people seemed to put those on at the drop of a hat.)  I always think of these guys as a glee club or something like that – of course I would like it better if they were all wearing their Felix masks – maybe I will find that variation some day if I am very lucky.

 

Cat Costume – Photo Album Pages Continue

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Pam Photo Album Page Post:  These were an anniversary gift, back in ’12 I think.  Ain’t I the lucky girl?  And weren’t these folks having a high old time?

A short post since these speak for themselves, I think.  This is one of a few groups I will ultimately share of catty costumes from more or less the same period.  (Although my all time favorite is a series of Devils in Brooklyn…and I have one strange story about buying photos that appear to be from the same session from different sellers in different states at different times.)  I like to keep photos of a group together when possible, even if I don’t display all of them.  I am sad that the one has damage – in some ways it is the best one.

Not much else to say except, Halloween sure isn’t as cool as it used to be!

Cat Photo Collage

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Pam Photo Post:  Early cat comics?

I have long been interested in the period where the carefully arranged photo album page morphs into these photo collages done with negatives and artful printing.  I was very excited about an exhibit a few years ago, Playing with Pictures: The Art of Victorian Photocollage, which originated at the Chicago Art Institute (’09) and made a stop here in New York at the Met.  (The catalogue is still available, for a price, on Amazon.)  It was an amazing opportunity to see the best of these, many featuring skilled watercolor and ink drawings, most often executed by woman. However, there is a lot to be said for the less spectacular examples too. Just look at these hard-working kitties on the USS Mississippi!

To date this is the only one in my collection and the only cat one of this kind I have ever seen, despite some pretty thorough ongoing scouring. You do find the whole, elaborate collages reproduced on Victorian or later period cards, and I have seen a number of cat themed ones that way. While I have been tempted by early albums and whole pages from albums, I tend to think my limited storage is not the best home for these fragile artifacts, but I do find them fascinating – windows into whole lost worlds.  Of course, if one devoted to cats came along I assume I would change my mind!

The Giant Cat Chair

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post – Having had a quick look at the Felix-y postcards yesterday and continuing on something of a summer holiday theme, I offer an equally (if more scarce) alternative – the giant cat chair.  I only learned of the existence of these a couple of years ago and it was thanks to a FB post of a google image.  As chance would have it, I did a search on ebay shortly after and turned up this fellow! As far as I can tell, these only existed in England – although frankly I could be wrong as I have only seen about four or five – I own three of them – the most recently acquired I used to kick off this blog.  (In my mind I have this really great image of Great Britain in the ’20’s and ’30’s as this very jolly place where folks were having their photos taking with giant cat dolls every day of the week – what was wrong with the US?)  These were some lucky children!

If you are feeling overwhelmed with posts to this new blog – I am on vacation and enjoying the opportunity to get things rolling, as well as finding my way technically.  Once I am back at work I am sure things will slow considerably.

Let the Cats Begin!

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Pam photo postcard blog post.  So today I start at square one for me and a pleasant August beach-y theme to suit our vacation mode; folks posing with Felix.  The first one I ever saw was in a wonderful book on the history of Felix that Kim gave me when we first got together.  There is this single amazing image from a museum in Australia, I think (Australia, New Zealand and the UK is where they all seem to originate from – which begs the question – why the heck weren’t they being made here?  Coney Island?  I’ve never seen one taken in the US – anyone?) and man, if you had told me in those pre-eBay days that I would own 40 or so of these I would have figured I had died and gone to heaven!  To even see one in person seemed unlikely – I didn’t even know that they were running around in the world, although I should have suspected.  As you can see from the one in the bottom, this also embraces the too cheap to purchase a real stuffed Felix photo – these are fun too.  People also liked to pose with their own Felix – the same as they liked to pose with their own cats.

Obviously this is a theme I will be returning to – I intend to get the whole collection up over time! There are lots of stories to tell and we’ll get to them all eventually!