Fabergé Friday

Feels like it's time for an egg again! As Fabergé made lots of egg pendants there is a big chance of actually getting to be the owner of one of those - if you have the money of course... Today's egg pendant is made in the Russian Revival Style, that became popular in 1870, when Victor Butovsky published a book named Histoire de l'Ornement Russe du Xe au XVIe Siècle d'apres les Manuscrits, which reproduced hundreds of Russian medieval ornaments.

This tiny egg 3/4 inches (2 centimeters) high, is made of gold, and decorated with rose-cut diamonds, and guilloché and champlevé enamels in translucent blue, orange and green, and opaque white and black.  

Champlevé is an enameling method in which decorations are carved into the surface of a metal object and filled with enamel (glass powder). After the enamel has been melted by fire and then cooled, the surface is polished. Since the colored stripes on this egg pendant is only 1/25 inches (1 millimeter) wide, you can understand how accomplished the egg's creator - head workmaster Erik Kollin - was.

The pendant was made around 1885, and now it's for sale again! So if you want it, take out 35,000 USD from your mattress, and follow this link to Romanov Russia!

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Sofia Sanchez & Mauro Mongiello - Don't Look Back

For the 6th issue of Tar Magazine 2011, photographers Sofia Sanchez and Mauro Mongiello did a photo series called Don't Look Back, featuring model Anna de Rijk. Love these ones...

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Outfit Post

When I was in Paris I walked into a lovely little shop, and was greeted by a dog. The shop was shared by four or five different designers, who sold their creations - everything from hats and jewelry, to clothes - in different parts of the shop. The reason I went in was because I had spotted a top in the window I needed to take a closer look at. It's designer's name is Meral Akrour, and yes, it ended up coming home with me...

The top is made in a lovely, flowy fabric, and the color is orangey red.

It ties at the back of the neck, and what you can't see in the picture, is that it has an opening going from the neck and then really far down on the back! Here I'm wearing it with a skirt from Daisy Dapper, and seamed stockings from What Katie Did. This evening I was off to perform at Wotever at Bonden Bar, so wearing a top underneath which I didn't need a bra was perfect. Bras leave ugly marks on your skin you know, which you don't want when taking off your clothes in a burlesque show. Many things to think about...

I had a lovely evening with the crazy Wotever-people, and performed my "Diamonds are Forever" act. The audience made lots of noise, so I guess they appreciated it. The only annoying thing was that two days before the show I had slipped on my tulle skirt, taken a very gracious dive to the floor, and twisted my whole bad leg. So now my evil Pain Demon has been back for the last, almost two weeks. I had decided that I was going to perform anyway, but since then I've spent the rest of the days just sitting as still as I can. Really scary to feel this horrible pain again, but I'm hoping for the best - that it goes away fast this time!!! 

Found some more pictures of that top on Meral Akrour's Facebook page by the way. Now I want that white, transparent one with dots to!!!

Full Moon

When I first saw Russian artist Leonid Tishkov's ongoing project - Private Moon - I fell instantly in love with it, and wanted to be part of it myself. I mean, who doesn't want a moon of their own?! The project is "a mobile installation and visual poem telling a story of a man who met the Moon and stayed with her forever. This man, it seems, could be the wonderfully romantic Russian artist Leonid Tishkov - literally living the performance of a lifetime as he travels the world with his own private moon." The citation is from an interview Tilla Buden of Gestalt Journal made with Tishkov. He then published it on his blog, and the rest of the text in this post is excerpts from that interview. All pictures are also from his blog.

What initially inspired the Private Moon series?

Ten years ago I created this installation with the glowing moon at one of the festivals of contemporary art. 
I wanted to make a picture of the reality of my favorite artist – Belgian surrealist Rene Magritte. After  that 
I brought the moon to the roof of my studio on a skyscraper on the South of Moscow, where she shone 
to me personally, and brightened my loneliness.

What does this series mean to you?

This is not just a series – it is a performance of a lifetime! I have traveled Private Moon for ten years and

each time the moon reveals more space to me. The moon is a shining point that brings people together

from different countries, of different nationalities and cultures. And everyone who gets in its orbit does

not forget it ever. It gives fairytale and poetry in our prosy and mercantile world.

You have described this work as a visual poem, and often accompany your images with poetry too. Which comes first for you, the words or the images?

Poetry is born in the image. Before placing a Private moon in a place that I like, I look at it for a very long

time. Often this is the place that I see as the basis of the poem. In the first pictures you see my country

house, the bed on which I sleep and write poetry, I myself as a lonely poet and philosopher – in the hat

and cloak of my departed father. The world is beautiful around us, you just illuminate it with the light of

poetry! And for me, the light of the moon is the perfect poetry.

How has collaboration enriched your art practice?

I am grateful to everyone who walked by my side as I’m carrying the moon around the world. You see,

I’m an artist and a poet, I have no other life but to dance of the dance of the moon mad dervish. And if

someone comes up beside me and will dance with me, and if the stars respond to this dance – then a

miracle happens – an art is born. And I hope that everyone who danced with me got a bit of inspiration

for his work and for his life.

To see this amazing, ongoing project, and follow Leonid Tishkov and his Moon on a journey across the whole world, visit his blog!

PS. Tonight's (June 23rd) full moon will also be a Super Moon! So that means the moon will be closer to Earth than it has been during all of 2013. If the sky is clear where you live, go out and watch it!

Fabergé Friday

I feel it's time for a brooch - by Fabergé of course! This one was made by workmaster Henrik Wigström, sometime between 1908-1917!

The brooch - 1 1/2 inches (3,7 centimeters) in diameter - is made of a plaque of moss agate, that looks like a picture of a misty forest. 

The reeded gold frame is tied with silver ribbons, set with rose-cut diamonds. This brooch is right now for sale at Romanov Russia, for the slight sum of 25,000 USD!

Today we celebrate Midsummer's Eve in Sweden, so Happy Midsummer everyone!!! And I just discovered I have gotten my first mosquito bite for this year. So I think I have to go scratch that now...

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Au-Contraire Photography

I just discovered one more of those photographers who's photos just draw me in and make me dream - wishing I was in one of those pictures... Her name is Melanie Plum, and the name of her studio is Au-Contraire Photography. She lives in Aachen, Germany, and she is self-taught. I don't really feel I need to say so much about these pictures. Just look, and dream away...

All photos are from Au-Contraire Photography's Facebook page.