Black Widows and Boudoir Dolls

The other year my dear friend Lindy Lou was bitten by a Black Widow spider.
She is fine and is still the crazy Olde Broad she has always been.
I am slightly sad that she hasn't become a Superhero though...
(Or has she, I mean, they have to keep their secret identity, well, secret don't they? mmmm)

So, I had this idea floating around my head, (usually in bed when I'm really trying to sleep), of creating a Boudoir Doll who was also a Victorian Mourning Doll.
Then after this horrific encounter with an arachnid (he he) I thought maybe I could also add Black Widow to the list of ideas.
After all, to the Victorians, more was most certainly...more.

So here she is in all her Gothic glory.
Mistress Charlotte (see what I did there?).
I thought that rather than make a 'spider' I would use the colours of the Black Widow instead. I also thought she would look nice with velvet and lace, who doesn't ?
She has big spider eyes which also look like she has been weeping, even spider widows cry.
'My my Charlotte, what big eyes you have...'
'Well, my dear, I am a Spider'

I love Mourning Dolls and the idea of a Victorian Spider Widow is just so absurd that I think she could get away with anything.
Hence, the hair...wild and pouffy...(my children think her hair is like Helena Bonham Carter's).
I have added a very soft veil, it's so soft to stroke...
I like being able to see through the veil to the world beyond, sorry I'm getting lost in metaphysical things again. :o)

She has really big feet, no idea why, I just love big feet (mine are not big, maybe I'm overcompensating?).
Maybe I just like my big dolls to be much bigger than my teeny dolls, so everything is bigger?
Who can say...

I hope Lindy Lou will not mind me using her encounter with the Black Widow in this way, but I'm sure that when she climbs down from the web in the corner of the ceiling, she will let me know :o)

So now comes the part any creative person has learned to love...
What will the next thing be?
We never know where or when that odd thought will prod us and the Muses will wake us from our dreams and demand we do something to satisfy their desires.
I'm not complaining though, I love the Muses.
How else could we turn something so nasty as a spider bite into a doll? :o)

I think it's time for some tea...

Is It Weird To Love Potions?

This is just a little part of my 'Snape Cupboard' :o)

Is it weird to love potions?
I mean, to really love them?
I have a cabinet in my kitchen which my children call my 'Snape Cupboard' can't think why *wink * it has a lifetime's worth of potion and herb collecting in it.
I find it pleasing to just look at the bottles, all shapes and sizes, and the old labels and the gunk inside them...it's like turning on a magic switch...click!
I am now a fully-fledged wizard from the dark ages...well, maybe...

So, it just seems natural for me to add a little helper to the brew...
This is Mr Algernon Crowe, Scarecrow Wizard and Potion Master!
I shall only post one picture of him here as he is beginning to show off a little (he is taking over my facebook page!) Old Lace and Laudanum

No, I will not say Abracadabra!

I'm not sure if he is a help or a hindrance really but he is rather good company...
He likes to sing while he brews...he may dress like a Crow but he has the voice of a...Raven ;o)
Now, where have all of those crows gone?

So, What Do Artist's Do All Day?

They wrestle Monsters!

I have a dirty little secret...
I have a Faerie Persona...'Oberon's Wood'.
There, it is out, I can now join the secret society of artists who 'Do Fantasy'!
This means that I will never, ever be taken seriously as an 'Artist'.
It isn't that I am ashamed...I would have mentioned it before but Victorian things got in the way...so...

I have been painting faeries, I enjoy this, sometimes though they just refuse to sit still long enough for me to capture them, they're tricky, faeries!
I am also sculpting portraits of dead people.
How my mind works is a puzzle.
In one day I can be drawing a beautiful little fae child, then later have my arms covered in clay trying to decide how to create a new 'Memento Mori'...is there something wrong with me?

I also make teeny things...teeny things are a problem.
The more teeny things you create, the more of your house they take over.
I am thinking that the time has come to pack them all away in an old trunk and chain them up!
But I would just feel sorry for them and let them come out for a while, maybe feed them, you know what happens then...

I draw every day.
I think drawing is my happy place.
I was drawing a balloon this morning...see what I mean...my mind has a mind of its own.
I sit on the sofa, (I do not have a studio, which is a problem when I am painting), and have a cup of tea and some dark chocolate by my side and just draw...a truly happy place.

Later though...I enter the 'Painting Place'...cue scary music...this is not such a happy place, it is full of monsters and doubts and struggles...it pulls my hair and pinches me.
It calls me names and sniggers at me.
It mocks me.
Painting...
Painting is tricky, you have to make sure that you use the correct brushes, not the ones you have just been painting faeries in oils with and then decide to touch-up a watercolour...doesn't work, believe me!
I love to paint but I don't feel that am very good at it.
I have doubts about my abilities.
I think many artists are like this.
The more I learn about the way you should paint, the less I know how to paint.
I am what the 'establishment' would call a 'Kitchen Painter', they mean this in a derogatory way, to me it is a necessity, it is the only place available for me to paint and sculpt.
A kitchen painter I am.

Someone once said to me, that it must be lovely to be able to 'just create things'...oh deary deary me...
If only they knew.
Faeries, dead folks, balloons...
Yes, it is lovely to 'just create things'.
Lovely in the same way that my chocolate tastes before I think about it making me tubby.
Lovely in the way that your children grow up and fly away and do not need you anymore.
Lovely in the way the familiar old person looks at you in your mirror.
And then I turn to my 'Memento Mori' once more...
This leads to thoughts of life and death and also what kind of art you will be leaving behind.
What will your achievements be?
If any?
See what I mean...it's lovely.

Though, to be honest, I find the temptation to create things so delicious that I face my monsters head on.
Face to face.
Bring it on...
Or at least wait until I have made the cookies (in my 'studio') and have one in my hand as a shield.
Then I can face anything...
Even Art!

Mistress Lillian, the Ghost Bride.

As promised, here she is, a little the worse for wear after roaming around the mountains looking for her ghostly lost love.

 

After hearing the news of her love's tragic accident, she put on her bridal gown and locked herself in her boudoir until, overcome with grief, she died of a broken heart...

I do hope that they will embrace once more..I hate sad endings...

For those wanting to see a little more of Lillian, she can be found hiding in my photo albums on facebook
https://www.facebook.com/OldLaceAndLaudanum/photos_stream?tab=photos_albums
Or Etsy
https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/OldLaceAndLaudanum

As for me...I'm still trying to tame that unruly redhead's mane...

In memory of E. H. Steele

 Among some of my Victorian photographs there is one which I found so poignant that it slipped into my dreams.
The dreams were a little sad as I thought about how short some lives are and of the sadness for those we leave behind.
This made me think about a loved one, grieving, which in turn led to the creation of  Mistress Lillian, a Gothic Bride Doll, who sadly, never got to marry her beloved. (Photo's of Lillian will be shown in another post)

The reverse of the photograph says this...

'E. H. Steele, Townsend
Killed by a fall from a cliff near Montreux
Aug. 10 1864-
aged 24

This carte given to me by his dear mother.'

Really, if I had tried to imagine a sadder tale for my doll I do not think I could have found one.
Twenty four is so young it is just so tragic.
I cannot find any more information about this person (and I have tried) so all I am left with is this little photograph of his face peering through the years back at us...a moment caught in time.

I do hope that he does not mind me making Lillian for him.
At least now, his story is not altogether forgotten...

Ever had a bad hair day?

Sometimes you just feel like pulling your hair out!
This poor miss has been waiting for her maid to sort out her locks all day but she is nowhere to be seen.
(probably off with the stage-hand somewhere)
Looks like it will have to be me then....now which hair style shall I try?
'I do believe this season all the most fashionable ladies are wearing their hair swept up madam.'

I'll let you know if I manage to tame these unruly locks, I may be some time...

What becomes of the broken-hearted dolls?

I've been gathering together all of the little broken hearts I have made...seeing them all lying there made me feel a little sad.
They are going to hang beneath my doll's skirt as she is collecting them.
This lady has turned out to be quite a challenge but I am enjoying creating her!
She has no hands as yet so I don't want her to face the public...soon though...

I wonder if it will take long for the little broken hearts to mend?