I spotted a very intriguing exhibition at Art Daily a few weeks ago. Two years in the making, "Beauty by Design: Fashioning the Renaissance" has finally opened at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. I was hoping there would be something about cosmetics or beauty included (not that a fashion exhibition wouldn't be great by itself) and sure enough, there is! From the museum's website: "The exhibition showcases two different, but inter-connected strands of research activity: responding to old-master paintings in the National Galleries’ collections, UK-based fashion designers have created new works using high-quality materials such as lace, while renaissance art specialists have explored ideas about beauty and cosmetics. The theme of body image is central: the historic paintings have been approached both as a means of challenging current perceptions of physical beauty, and as inspiration for a more diverse and emotionally considerate practice on the part of today’s fashion designers."
This is quite a novel approach of linking Renaissance art to contemporary fashion and notions of beauty. Rather than simply gathering and displaying Renaissance clothing and portraits, which, again, would still make for a terrific exhibition on its own, the organizers developed a unique concept in demonstrating how art from the Renaissance can be reinterpreted as a counterpoint to today's beauty standards. They explain it better than I can: "The beautiful bodies of the Renaissance – the fleshy women of Titian or Rubens or the androgynous forms of Michelangelo or Leonardo – are a long way away from today’s size zero model, yet both have been considered ideals of beauty in these diverse societies..the project aims to promote and reinstate a healthier attitude towards diversity of body image and beauty. The research team will seek to unravel historical codes of beauty and innovate towards new fashion design and communication solutions."
While I find the fashion aspect fascinating, obviously my attention is mostly on the cosmetics and beauty part of the exhibition. Since I can't catch a plane to Scotland at the moment I'm unable to delve into any details about these topics, but there is a short essay about beauty ideals depicted in one of the paintings here. Additionally, that page led me to Making Up the Renaissance, which is described as "a collaborative project to research and disseminate information about renaissance cosmetics." The site doesn't appear to be active now, but offers a wealth of resources and research on Renaissance makeup and beauty practices. Make sure to check out the "further reading" page, as there are lots of good sources to look up. I was especially heartened to see that this site is maintained by Dr. Jill Burke, an art historian (my failed dream career!) specializing in Italian Renaissance visual culture.
Another interesting person of note: the contributors section of the Beauty by Design website lists Sharon Lloyd, a faculty member at Southampton Solent University who teaches in the Media and Fashion Styling program there and specializes in "theoretical application and debate surrounding beauty, make-up and hair design." I would love to see the specific work she did for the Beauty by Design exhibition, but in lieu of that, I enjoyed abstracts of various papers she's written about makeup here – I wish I could read the full papers.
If anyone lives in Scotland or will be traveling there before the exhibition closes on May 3rd, 2015, I'm all ears for a full review (and pictures if you were allowed to take them!)
While not as spectacular as some of Armani’s previous holiday offerings, I was pleased enough with the Orient Excess palette to buy it. The palette comes with a sapphire blue velvet pouch.
Unlike the palettes from 2009 and 2008, there is no bling on the outer side of the case, but the deep blue is quite striking on its own.
Inside, Armani went for a simple cascade of thin vertical lines of varying lengths streaming from the top of the palette, some punctuated with stars. It’s an abstract design but still is reminiscent of holiday/winter motifs, like baubles dangling from a Christmas tree or perhaps icicles. Like the T.LeClerc Paris in Winter palette, the beauty of the design lies in its subtlety – no harsh colors or glitter, or even prominent shimmer.
The eye shadow tier:
Naturally I had to see whether there was any direct connection to Armani’s recent fashion shows. The fall ready-to-wear show was the inspiration for the Organica palette so it’s not from that. I checked the fall couture show and nope, there was nothing there either that would suggest any relation to the palette. So I went to the press release about the holiday collection and found this description: “To celebrate the end of the year, the Orient Excess collection invites you on an exotic journey to the snowy steppes of the Far North. These immaculate plains, covered in frost and stretching as far as the eye can see, inspired by Giorgio Armani Beauty to create a polar atmosphere through pure and intense make-up.” That certainly paints a picture and the highlighter does bring to mind some sort of frozen tundra-filled landscape, but there’s still no explicit reference to Armani clothing.
Then I came across an article announcing Armani’s Luxury White capsule collection. For a capsule it’s rather large, running the gamut from jackets and sweaters to shoes and bags. However, the color scheme is restrained, consisting only of variations of white and ivory. The variety of textures keeps the pieces interesting though, as alpaca, rabbit fur, silk, and three types of cashmere were used. As you can see from the sketches the collection’s title is apt. The fur-collared trench coat and the bathrobe (ooh, is it cashmere?) look particularly sumptuous to me. While there are only sketches of the clothing online, stock photos of some of the accessories were released, like a rabbit fur trimmed bag.
So while I have no quote from Armani about the link between this collection and the Orient Excess lineup, I’m pretty sure Luxury White was the inspiration, especially when you consider the model in the Orient Excess ad, who is swathed in white fur. There’s also a line from the aforementioned press release that calls to mind the extravagant textures used in the Luxury White collection: “Featuring a porcelain, universally translucent face powder for that essential, winter glow and a trio of eyeshadows, inspired by the softest mink, chinchilla and sable furs, to bring a touch of animal warmth to translucent skin.”
(image from beautyscene.nl)
What do you think of the Orient Excess palette? Think my theory about it being loosely based on the Luxury White collection holds any water?
As I'm still trying to build my knowledge of vintage cosmetics and beauty history, I thought this book would a valuable addition to my collection. Beauty and Cosmetics: 1550-1950 by Sarah Jane Downing is one of the few easily available resources that condenses the history of Western beauty practices and ideals in one short tome. That's essentially my only gripe with this book – it's honestly more of a booklet, topping out at a mere 64 pages. I would dearly love to see something much longer and in-depth.
The first chapter discusses beauty ideals in Renaissance Europe and their roots in medieval religious beliefs. While it wasn't my favorite read, it provides the necessary groundwork for the upcoming chapters. The second chapter, in my opinion, is where things get more interesting as Downing reveals some fascinating details on the ingredients and processes used in cosmetics production from that time. She begins with the beauty regimen of Queen Elizabeth I, which included painting her face with the highly poisonous ceruse, "a concoction of finely ground white lead powder, mixed with vinegar and applied over the face and neck." Ack! The author notes that while alternatives made of alabaster or starch were available, these did not provide the luminous, completely smooth perfection that a lead-based product did.
The next chapters deal with cosmetics usage in the 17th and 18th centuries. I was quite intrigued by the information on "patches", a.k.a. fake beauty marks or moles. I have been meaning to write a post on these for a while now (I got the idea around the time I wrote about faux freckles) and Downing's work will definitely be included as a reference. I'm now also a little obsessed with the idea of acquiring an antique patch box. The illustration of an aging woman applying patches (below) is fabulous, but I would have loved to have seen a few pictures of actual patch boxes.
Another interesting tidbit: to counteract the hair loss caused by the frequent wearing of ceruse, women sported false eyebrows made from mice fur. I guess this isn't so weird, given that in the 21st century we have fake eyelashes made from mink.
Next up, Downing describes the dramatic turn beauty trends took in the early 19th century. The heavily caked-on white makeup and patches so popular with the French aristocracy quickly fell out of favor after the revolution. A more natural look was strongly preferred, although sometimes this also made use of an equally dangerous method as ceruse. "A derivative of deadly nightshade, belladonna – 'beautiful lady' – was so named for its beautifying effects as it would dilate the pupils, making the eyes poetic, dark limpid pools. Unfortunately the side effects were less than pretty as it could also cause blindness and possibly paralysis." Yikes.
This chapter also touches on the monumental shift in how cosmetics were perceived and the rise of the beauty industry in the late 19th century. While images of ideal beauty remained fairly consistent (patches and plucked brows aside, other attributes – rosy cheeks and lips, sparkling eyes, clear skin – were still in style) there was a sea change in how the products required to achieve these qualities were produced. Plenty of women still relied on homemade potions made with recipes passed down through generations, but pharmacies selling pre-mixed unguents were rapidly expanding . Below are some of the earliest beauty ads I've ever seen (1880 on the left and 1897 on the right).
The final two chapters outline how the industry took off in the early 20th century and the formation of the major brands we know today. While other books have covered this era, it's refreshing to see another perspective joining in with different ads and bits of history.
The bottom line: as with basically all beauty books I've reviewed, this is a great read for anyone interested in beauty history. However, it is by no means comprehensive (not that I think it was meant to be) so it left me yearning for more, despite the "further reading" list included in the back. Perhaps Ms. Downing and I could collaborate and write a book on beauty in the same time period but have it be 10 times as long. I can dream, right?
The holiday collections are rolling in and little peeks of other holiday swag are starting to make their way into stores, so it’s high time I address the fall 2014 exhibition situation. As you may have guessed from the title of this post and from several other hints I’ve been dropping since, oh, February, my plan was to not do a traditional seasonal exhibition but do one on ’90s beauty and the revival that ’90s trends have been enjoying lately. This is an area in which that I declare myself to be an expert, and thought, would it really be so difficult? The answer: yes.
Here’s my story about the various challenges that prevented me from executing the exhibition, or even a week’s worth of posts on the subject (that was my alternate plan). Figured I might as well make it a ’90s gif party to better express my tale of woe.
First, there was the packaging issue. Look, I love the ’90s. It was “my” decade. However, from a design/packaging standpoint, there wasn’t a whole lot to look at. Pretty embossed powders, to my knowledge, didn’t really begin to take off until the early aughts. To make an exhibition focused heavily on ’90s products work, you have to add in many more elements. I could have sat a vintage bottle of Hard Candy’s Sky nail polish or Revlon Toast of New York lipstick on my shelves, but it just wouldn’t have much visual impact even with the addition of ads or other ephemera.
My rudimentary home museum setup works well enough for seasonal exhibitions, but wouldn’t properly capture an entire decade. It would be necessary to highlight these objects in more grandiose ways than I’m capable of. If I had a real museum you better believe visiting a ’90s beauty exhibition would be like stepping back in time – it would be a multi-sensory experience.
Secondly, accessible resources are lacking unless you’re in the beauty industry or in academia. While I have plenty of beauty history books, they don’t have extensive info about the ’90s beauty or even good, easy-to-find sources (I looked in the footnotes). I don’t have access to the Condé Nast archive or Women’s Wear Daily, and many important articles about beauty are trapped within those and others like them. It’s just evil that they don’t make these more easily available or affordable (looking at you, WWD).
So I ended up ordering a bunch of ’90s issues of Allure on E-bay, which proved to be not only expensive but also incomplete. I couldn’t do a whole exhibition based on a few measly magazines.
While I gleaned some useful information and ads from them, in the end it didn’t feel like enough. Plus the thought of tearing out and scanning vintage ads made me very sad.
Plenty of information about ’90s beauty is online but I found it consists mostly of slideshows of the same ’90s products everyone already remembers, or a quick report of some celebrity updating a ’90s trend. There are tons of articles which are helpful as a starting-off point, but they all just barely scratch the surface. I’m guessing this is in part because most online articles are written by milennials who were mere children in the ’90s.
I wanted to remind people of things they hadn’t remembered, or at least explore the bigger trends and topics much more in-depth than you would see anywhere else, since, as someone who came of age in the ’90s and started nurturing my beauty addiction back then, I’m in an excellent position to do so.
For example, it occurred to me that I wanted to have a totally kick-ass infographic with a timeline and fun facts about beauty in the ’90s that you didn’t already know – sort of like Allure’s “By the Numbers” feature but with spectacular design. Good idea, yes?
But with such meager resources I couldn’t do it.
The lack of time was also a huge obstacle. I regularly fantasize about quitting my job and writing about beauty and various other topics and also establishing a physical beauty museum.
In reality I have to work a regular boring full-time job and squeeze in blogging whenver I can, and it’s a rather sad blog as I have virtually no readers.
Anyway, to make a good exhibition that goes well beyond the usual seasonal ones would essentially be a full-time job. The alternative of putting up a mediocre exhibition on such a rich topic didn’t sit well with me.
The final nail in the coffin was technology. Since I am a bit older (that’s how you know I truly am a ’90s woman) I was planning on uploading my ultimate ’90s playlist for readers to listen to while they browsed the exhibition, but figuring out how to create an online playlist proved too complicated and overwhelming for me.
The bottom line is that it was too broad of a topic to cover the way I wanted to, and rather than put up something that’s just meh, I scrapped the exhibition/posts entirely.
It would make a good book though, I think. Wouldn’t it be cool if I could write the definitive book on beauty in the ’90s?
Note: I already have a title picked out and so help me if anyone steals it I will have no choice but to get violent.
So that is my very long-winded explanation about why there is no fall exhibition this year. But keep your eyes peeled for the holiday exhibition – that one is definitely a go. As a matter of fact I’m off to order some more objects for it. Bye now!
Neatorama had posted this a while back and I was immediately intrigued. Makeup + miniatures = awesomeness. Spanish photographer Juan Sánchez Castillo primarily works on high fashion campaigns, but a new series, Making It Up, shows a more playful side. Making It Up combines close-ups of a model's face with miniatures to create visually appealing and whimsical vignettes, inspired by his wife's love of miniatures and his own passion for beauty photography. He says, "My wife loves miniature figures. She used to have whole doll houses filled with little figurines and furniture. And I really love beauty and fashion photography. Whenever I find creative images of miniature figures on the internet I always have to show them to her. With our two hobbies combined, my collection of inspirational images became the beginning of this project. I came across several creative photography projects with miniature figures placed into landscapes and photographed with female bodies. My own creative project idea was then born in my mind. I have been longing to shoot some beauty images, but make them look like landscapes and place miniature figures into them."
Let's take a look.
Faceclimbers:
The Gardener:
Painters at Work:
Painters at Work II:
Playing in the Snow (my favorite):
(images from designboom.com)
The project took six months of planning, and they were shot all in one day. You can read more about the painstaking process of arranging the miniatures here.
I love this series because it captures the essence of what makeup application is about: the art of understanding the contours and planes of one's face to strategically apply cosmetics, determining where the shadows and highlights should go – it's essentially thinking about faces as landscapes with their own unique topography. Castillo's images express this concept literally in a fresh, fun way.
What do you think? I love closeups of pretty makeup application and I love miniatures, so this was a total win for me.
Some new staff members arrived earlier this week. Say hello to Cowardly Lion Babo and Origins Babo!
I think since Cowardly Lion Babo is still a bit skittish despite getting his courage medal I will make him an intern. Plus he'll get along well with the Museum's other intern Babo Bear (lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Well, no tigers…) I'm not sure what Origins Babo will do. I might make him in charge of Membership Services.
I'm off to see how they're getting along with the others!
I spotted one of Essence's many fall collections over at Chic Profile and was a tad smitten. Their 2014 Oktoberfest collection brings back the deer motif and gingham pattern we saw last fall.
This year they added a carousel design, which was very cute (although I still think Paul & Joe's Carousel collection from spring 2013 has the lock on that).
My favorite though was the pretzel. I think this is the first time I've seen a pretzel on makeup. In fact, it's rare to see a savory treat on beauty products. Most of the time it's desserts.
How cute does it look on the blush?!
(images from essence.eu)
If Essence were available in the States I would snatch these up. I just love the novelty of having a blush or eye shadow with pretzels on it. Maybe next year Essence will have a frosty beer mug embossed on their Oktoberfest collection. Ha!
For fall 2014 Paul & Joe released 10 new lipstick cases, along with new lipstick colors and several eye shadow trios. Sadly, I found the inspiration behind the collection to be rather insipid. "Paul & Joe wants to make you feel like a movie star! You'll cause a paparazzi frenzy everywhere you go in any of these Paul & Joe lipstick red carpet favorites. Paul & Joe will make you a star with these 3 eye color trio cinematic classics!" Eh. I miss the days when they actually had a little narrative for each collection. Plus, the theme of feeling like a celebrity through the power of makeup has been done to death by many brands, most notably Stila. Having said all that, do you really think I could resist any of the LE lipstick cases?
I positively loved this bird case. The illustration is so delicate and pretty, it reminds me of something you'd find on an antique Japanese folding screen.
But my favorite was the one with the beautiful Delftware-inspired pattern that included a bear and a little bird.
This pattern appeared in many of the Paul & Joe Sister items for fall 2014. I have to say that this is a rare miss for Paul & Joe. I generally hate wearing prints, but if any designer was going to make me buy a piece of clothing with a print on it it would be Paul & Joe – the ones they come up with are so unique and the manner in which they use them is usually impeccable. As I much as I adore this particular design, I think it's best left to decorative objects and not clothing.
(images from paulandjoe.com)
It also appeared on some of the men's items as well.
(images from paulandjoe.com)
It was nice to see cat-obsessed Paul & Joe founder Sophie Albou toss dog people a bone (see what I did there?) and come up with a dog print for the lipstick case, which also was used extensively in the Sister and men's collections.
(image from paulandjoe.com)
I liked the little geometric fox as well, which, again, appeared in both the Sister and men's collections. (Now here the pattern works – I would totally wear this quirky fox-printed blouse!)
(images from paulandjoe.com)
While there were plenty of new prints, Paul & Joe re-released some vintage ones as well. I was happy to see these since I don't have any of them in lipstick form. The blue and orange bird print was from fall 2003, and the yellow cat print was from spring 2005 (I only have this in notebook form). The floral print shown immediately to the left of the cat print in my picture above was from the spring 2007 collection. I do have the Color Powder in that pattern but it never hurts to have a a complete set. 🙂
What do you think of the collection?
Last year I made a pilgrimage up to Manhattan to catch the exhibition of vintage lipsticks at the Makeup in New York show. This year I realized I had to go back for the 2014 show since it featured an exhibition of vintage compacts and powder boxes.
The banner was cool but I'm laughing at the date typo at the top. Those June dates were for the 2014 Makeup in Paris show. Whoops.
Inside there was a directory, which in hindsight I should have looked at before blindly wandering upstairs. I walked around the 2nd and 3rd floors before realizing the exhibition was on the 4th floor. I was just so eager and there weren't any maps being given out like last year.
I made it! I think there might have been an issue with this banner too, although this time I think it's a translation issue rather than a typo. In the directory banner and online the exhibition is referred to as "Praise of Complexion" while on the exhibition banner it says "An Ode to the Complexion". Oh well. I think perhaps they were just re-using the name of the 2012 Guerlain-sponsored exhibition, which featured many of the same items.
Exhibition view:
The tall handsome man on the far right holding a coffee cup and politely pretending to be interested is the husband. Isn't he sweet to come with me to the exhibition?
So let's get started. I didn't take pictures of every object but I did get a nice selection. These two ladies greeted me by the front door. They're papier maché powder boxes from 1920.
By the windows there was a great lineup, starting with some oddly surrealist powder boxes.
There were some lovely French 18th-century-inspired compacts and boxes from the 1920s. So even in the '20s companies were doing the retro packaging thing.
This display of Bourjois boxes was pretty cool.
I was thinking that if I ever did a bird-themed exhibition I'd definitely have to have a peacock display. Looks like Praise of Complexion beat me to it! The top box from Nylotis is from 1920 while the other box and compact are from 1930.
These two 1962 Heaven Sent compacts by Helena Rubinstein are so cute. The one on the left would be perfect for a holiday exhibition.
Here's the famous "Golden Gesture" compact by Volupté from 1945. (Why yes, that IS a Babo iPhone case. Come on, did you really expect me to have something else?)
Here's a bakelite bangle containing powder flanked by two lipsticks (1928).
As we know, celebrity collabs are nothing new. Check out these compacts featuring the A-list performers of their time.
There were also some quite fancy compacts on display that seem to be closer to the objects at the Ultra Vanities exhibition. On the left is a 1945 gold and silver compact encrusted with rubies by Boucheron and on the right is Hermès (1960).
I think what I enjoyed most though were the really old boxes, like these French ones from the 18th century.
The small one at the top has a picture of Marie Antoinette on the outer side of the case.
I was curious to know whether these selections were from a book, and indeed they were. This book is from 2012 but doesn't seem to be available for sale anywhere, which is a shame as it also was the impetus for the aforementioned Guerlain exhibition. 🙁
I didn't dare touch the book in the display, but I tried picking up the copy laying on the table to flip through it, only to find that the back cover was adhered to the table with putty. Respectful exhibition goer that I am, I took it as a sign that no one wanted it to be moved so I just perused it carefully while it was still laying flat. Not 10 minutes later I glanced back and it was gone. And NO, I didn't steal it! I'd be pissed if it were my exhibition and someone walked off with a copy of a book that was deliberately not supposed to be moved. I couldn't believe someone just snatched it. It's not like it could be mistaken for a free catalogue – there was only 1 besides the one standing upright in the display. Plus someone took the time to adhere it to the table with putty, indicating that you should only flip through it at the table.
Anyway, I thought display-wise it was a big improvement over last year. The labels were more informative and better designed, and there were pretty floral patterns on the backgrounds of the cases holding the compacts.
After I was done drooling over the exhibition we wandered around and a couple of other things caught my eye. Right behind the exhibition there was a booth from a company called Qualipac, which, apparently, was responsible for the spiky Louboutin nail polish bottle along with many other objects I recognized.
I asked the woman working there about the bottle and she said the Louboutin people were "very picky". I thought that was pretty funny. Then again, if they want people to shell out $50 for their nail polish they can't afford to put it in just any old packaging, right? Plus I imagine beauty companies would have the upper hand in terms of choosing a packaging vendor, given the sheer volume of them I witnessed at this show, so I bet they can be as picky as they want.
I can't remember which company this was but I loved the little lipstick tree they had set up.
This is a terrible picture but you can sort of make out the really cool floral print nail polish bottle caps in the lower right. I spied an array of wooden caps above too, so I'm speculating that this company (Pinkpac) may do the packaging for Sheswai.
I spotted something very interesting at this company's display. If you look towards the middle-left you'll see two Tom Ford lipsticks (one burgundy, the other ivory) covered in a croc-patterned leather case. I'm assuming this is just an example of what they would look like with leather casing and weren't actually put into production. Still, I wonder if we'll see them at a later time?
I couldn't resist picking up a t-shirt – something that wasn't available last year.
There was also a bag like last year with bits of swag. It had the same Pantone-esque collection of vendors and a pencil, but this year the pencil had glitter (ooh!) and there were also lipstick and nail polish samples.
So that's my tale from the 2014 Makeup in New York show. I hope there's an equally cool exhibition next year.
What are your thoughts?
I've obviously been very busy given the neglect of this poor little blog, but I was still collecting links over the past few weeks. Here's a massive catch-up.
– Here's a great piece at The Hairpin on the myth of white beauty and how actress Lupita Nyong'o is helping to "loosen the claws of colorism."
– NARS will be collaborating with designer Christopher Kane for a spring 2015 collection. I liked the Pierre Hardy collab so I'm excited to see what colors they'll come up with. Other news of note includes the Hourglass flagship opening in L.A. and an upcoming collaboration between Sephora and jewelry designer Alexis Bittar.
– A study by Lancôme shows that most women start to feel old at the age of 45 but feel 5 years younger up to that point. I guess I'm an anomaly – I've been feeling ancient since I was, oh, 18.
– Oh, take your stupid survey and shove it, St. Ives. I'm with this author over at the Beauty Plus – I don't give a flying fig what men think of my makeup.
– In beauty history, Beautiful With Brains shares some 19th century haircare recipes, while The Cut reports on the recent discovery of the remains of an ancient Egyptian woman sporting hair extensions. XOJane also shares yet more deadly or dangerous historical beauty practices.
– Sigh. Date rape drug-detecting nail polish, like so many anti-sexual assault strategies, puts the burden of prevention on the victim. See why it's a misguided idea here and here. How about focusing our energy on, you know, teaching people not to rape?
– Rouge Deluxe has the full scoop on the Shu Uemura Shupette holiday collection. I know where most of the Museum's budget is going this holiday season!
– Is my dream of an effective hands-free hair dryer finally coming to fruition?
– In beauty trends, faux freckles are making their way back to the spotlight, and Topshop's new freckle pencil is proof. Also check out XOVain's report on it, which includes a very nice shout-out to the Museum and a link to my post from last summer on fake freckles. Additionally, it looks like drawn-on spots are here to stay through spring 2015, as evidenced by several runway shows at New York Fashion Week and London Fashion Week.
– Speaking of NYFW, let's take a quick look at the top trends, shall we? I hate to say it but I'm not crazy about the biggest one: the no-makeup look. Models were sent down the runway with literally no makeup at all at Marc Jacobs, while at some shows they were deliberately made to look as though they were sweating. Ugh. The only beauty look I really liked was Rodarte's slightly punk eyebrow rings, which sadly isn't even wearable for the average woman, i.e. me. I guess we'll see what the spring makeup collections have to say.
The random:
– So I'm not that bright. A new study suggests that children's drawings show how smart they are. Given my god-awful drawings (I couldn't really even do a proper stick figure) I fear my IQ may be lower than I originally thought.
– In other art news: Hershey Park, eat your heart out. A chocolate museum just opened in Brussels, Belgium. Must. Go. And you all know how much I love Morris Louis, so it's great news that images of over 1,000 of his works have been made available online. Of course, there is always some news that pisses me off, like this nonprofit getting serious funding for a museum devoted to the history of video games. Once again I wonder why no one wants to pony up for a beauty museum.
– Coming off the heels of my re-watching of Strangers with Candy, I'm especially looking forward to this new animated Netflix series voiced by Amy Sedaris and Will Arnett.
– Being the huge Sleater-Kinney fan that I am, I have pre-ordered this very special box set. October 21st can't get here fast enough.
– Finally, I am heading north for the Makeup in New York show this week and I can't wait! Last year you may recall I went to see the collection of lipsticks that were on display from the book Lips of Luxury. This year I'm going to see "Praise of Complexion" which features vintage compacts and powder boxes. I'll be back with a full report. Too bad I won't have time to pop over to Brooklyn to see the "Killer Heels" exhibition.
What's going on with you?