{ feuilleton }

The glass menagerie

Not the play by Tennessee Williams, rather the glass sculptures of sea creatures by Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka.

Leopold (1822–1895) and Rudolf (1857–1939) Blaschka were a father and son partnership, originally from Bohemia. Their work making spectacular glass models of natural history objects began in 1857, in Germany. Rudolf joined his father in business in 1876 and after 1880 there were so many orders for their glass models that this became their sole business.

The Blaschkas are best known for their glass flowers, made from 1886 to 1936. Many of these are now displayed in the Botanical Museum of Harvard University. After his father’s death in 1895, Rudolf continued to make glass flowers. However, during their lifetimes they also made many accurate models of mainly marine animals. Dying with no children, their glass-working secrets were not passed on.

(More photos like this here.)

Looking at these sculptures I was curious to know whether they worked from real specimens or not. They may have used some for reference but I suspected many of their works were based on the famous colour plates of sea creatures, radiolaria, and so on, in Ernst Haeckel’s Kunstformen der Natur (1899–1904). A quick search confirms this, Haeckel was consulted, as were earlier scientific studies such as Philip Gosse’s Naturalist’s Rambles on the Devonshire Coast (1853) and GB Sowerby’s Popular History of the Aquarium of Marine and Fresh-Water Animals and Plants (1857).

(More photos like this here.)

Nancy Marie Brown writes about the Blaschka’s glass flowers (and what’s known of their working methods) here.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The Bowes Swan

William Burroughs gives thanks

Lest we forget…

William Burroughs.

Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 1986.

For John Dillinger
In hope he is still alive

Thanks for the wild turkey and the Passenger Pigeons, destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts —

thanks for a Continent to despoil and poison —

thanks for Indians to provide a modicum of challenge and danger —

thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin, leaving the carcass to rot —

thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes —

thanks for the AMERICAN DREAM to vulgarize and falsify until the bare lies shine through —

thanks for the KKK, for nigger-killing lawmen feeling their notches, for decent church-going women with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces —

thanks for “Kill a Queer for Christ” stickers —

thanks for laboratory AIDS —

thanks for Prohibition and the War Against Drugs —

thanks for a country where nobody is allowed to mind his own business —

thanks for a nation of finks — yes,

thanks for all the memories… all right, let’s see your arms… you always were a headache and you always were a bore —

thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams.• From Tornado Alley (1989).

Previously on { feuilleton }
• William Burroughs book covers
• Towers Open Fire

The Times makeover

The new masthead designed by Luke Prowse, with a coat of arms
by wood engraver Edwina Ellis.

So, in today’s Neville Brody news (no, I’m not intending on posting about him every day…) it seems the designer has been busy with colleague Luke Prowse making The (London) Times look better. Not before time (so to speak), it was starting to look very out-of-date beside the recent makeovers at The Guardian and Independent. Brody is evidently first choice for these kind of projects at the moment, confirming that he’s still one of our most important print designers.

Among the changes are a new typeface, Times Modern, which has been applied to a new design for the masthead. Considering that this is one of the most famous newspaper mastheads in the world, I hadn’t realised it had changed so much over the years. The Times website has a nice online gallery showing the development from its earliest days as “The Daily Universal Register” through to the present.

An early edition from 1788.

Brody has said of the new typeface, “Times Modern is a contemporary answer to the needs of compact newspapers. With pinched proportions, it allows more copy in the headline without compromising legibility. It is both authoritative and elegant, while robust at smaller sizes.” Since he’s on record expressing his dislike for Times New Roman, he must have enjoyed being given the opportunity to supplant an ugly and over-familiar font with something more suitable.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• 100 Years of Magazine Covers

Robert Altman, 1925–2006

“I’m very fortunate in my career. I’ve never had to direct a film
I didn’t choose or develop. My love for filmmaking has given me
an entrée to the world and to the human condition.”

100 Years of Magazine Covers

From Black Dog Publishing. Words by Steve Taylor, design by Neville Brody.

If you pick up a copy of this week’s Heat magazine in 30 years time, think how funny it will seem. Our obsession with D list celebrities’ private lives, weight loss and reality TV shows, will become ridiculous in the light of tomorrow’s trends.

Magazines provide us with snapshots of moments in cultural history. Their disposable nature means that they have to sell quickly, and their covers vie for attention on the shelves with images of beauty, sex, shock, humour and celebrity; presenting our fears, desires and aspirations crudely and honestly. When looked at retrospectively, they become fascinating documents that can tell us more about our past self-image than any academic text.

100 Years of Magazine Covers shows the best of these snapshots from throughout the past century. With images from Vogue, Life, Time, The New Yorker, Mayfair, and more subversive publications such as Oz and Sniffing Glue, this book will appeal to anyone and everyone with an interest in popular culture.