#we were both painting over the same portrait to figure out his facial features and there was a hot second he looked like adam sandler

[nivadu]

me and @merrimentforbidden gave my inquisitor a fresh coat of paint that almost led to a divorce, but he’s equal amounts of slimy and handsome now 👌

[kutemouse]

Paint Me Over

Disclaimer: I made and edited the gif I used for my header. That’s why I’ve posted this under the tag #btsgif. The footage belongs to BTS and BigHit, it’s obvs from one of Yoongi’s live streams. I also pulled the pic below from that footage. Feel free to use however you like, just please give me credit for the edit. Thanks 💜

I got this request on my Twitter account from @TheGirlInTheFloppyHat⁷ who said, “Soft stans please don't attack me, but a good looking guy, in a beret, casually rolling up his sleeves and painting away is hot as hell!!! HOT AS HELL!! 🔥 🔥 🔥 (Also, Yoongi the Renaissance Painter... Someone please take up the FanFic idea! 🤭🙈)”

Obviously, this is me volunteering to take up the idea because I agree, it is HOT. AS. HELL. 😂 I replied and told them I’d tag them once it was finished. Hope you like! Enjoy! 💜

Age Recommendation: 18+

Warnings: SMUT! Oral (f. receiving) as in face-sitting, smutty sex, Yoongi being a whole-ass Renaissance snacc, paint

Word Count: 1,546

Summary: You and Yoongi live in a modest home somewhere in Renaissance Italy, with him trying to earn a living through art. Unfortunately, you keep distracting him even though that’s nowhere near your intentions.

I sat in the corner of the room, subtly risking a glance at him from the pages of my book. Yoongi was currently swirling his paint brush in the tin filled with the darker blue, lost in thought. “Are you quite alright?” I asked, prompting him to flick his gaze my way.

“I am, thank you,” he murmured, fingers tugging at his beret. I let him carry on, admiring the way his trousers hugged his legs as he moved between the canvas and paint. When he shoved his tunic sleeves up his arms, showing off the creamy skin of those hands I loved pressing my lips to, I swallowed hard.

“I can feel you staring,” his deep bass grumbled.

I whipped my gaze back to my book. “Sorry.”

I listened to the scratching sound of the brush spreading color over the canvas, reveling in the way Yoongi inhaled as he smeared blue onto white, and the way he exhaled as he pulled the brush away. Risking another peek at him, I watched as he straightened, dipping the brush in the paint once more, before bending down the work on the bottom half of what would be his latest masterpiece. Yoongi repeated this action multiple times, silently working as I looked on. His hands were what my eyes were drawn to most, however, his veins popping as his grip on the brush tightened and loosened. I had to press my fingers to my mouth to stop from gasping at the sight.

Normally, he didn’t let me watch him work. Yoongi preferred for me to see the finished product, but as we’d had such little time together since his art started becoming popular, he relented and let me sit in on this painting’s creation. The only other time I’ve been allowed in the same room with him while he’s working is when I’m the one sitting for the portrait, and even then, I never got to see his process until now.

Yoongi finally sighed and set the brush down, his pale arms and smock now splattered with small droplets of blue paint. “You haven’t turned a page for nearly an hour,” he mused, looking at me with hooded eyes.

I opened my mouth to apologize once more, but he crossed the room and smothered my words with his soft mouth. “Never mind,” he murmured against my lips. “I was distracted, anyway. Your mere presence is a hindrance.”

“I can leave,” I muttered, attempting to turn away.

“No,” he growled, the sound low in his throat. “I want you to stay. Need you to stay.”

My eyes grew wide as he pulled me upright, his dark eyes boring into mine as he slid his hands around my waist. “Don’t be scared, my love.”

I shook my head. “I’m not scared,” I said breathlessly. Truthfully, I wasn’t. I was entranced… had been for the entire time I watched him work.

Yoongi reached around me and began loosening the ties of my dress, pressing his lips to the skin of my neck as he worked the strings loose. I sighed into his touch, trembling as he peeled the layer from my body, letting the fabric pool around my feet. He groaned at the sight of me just in my linen kirtle and corset. “Turn,” he ordered, and I spun. His nimble fingers worked at the knots keeping my corset together, skillfully undoing them the way he’d done so many times before. Yet I still shivered every time I felt his fingers touch my bare skin, trailing over my neck and shoulder as his other hand loosened the corset strings to the point where he was able to lift the piece of clothing over my  head and toss it in the corner.

I spun around, becoming painfully aware of the fact that he was still fully dressed. I tugged at the hem of his tunic and he smirked as he pulled it off. “Impatient tonight, are we?”

Biting my lip in response, I fumbled with the ties at his trousers and yanked them down to his ankles, kissing down his torso as I did so. Yoongi groaned loudly as my tongue flicked out, tasting the skin of his creamy pale thighs. I lingered there, pressing the flat of my tongue against his skin, licking my way upwards. “Enough,” he grunted.

Smirking, I refused to listen, doing the same to his other thigh. He growled and grasped my hands, yanking me upright. “I said enough teasing.” I shivered, his husky voice going straight to my already dampening core. Yoongi reached down and grasped the hem of my kirtle, pulling it over my head in one swift move, making me gasp as the cool air hit my naked form. My nipples instantly hardened, and Yoongi sat back, devouring me with his eyes.

“You know, no matter how much I paint, you are still the most beautiful work of art I’ve ever seen.”

I felt a blush creep its way up my cheeks, and reached up to cover my face with my hands. Yoongi grabbed my wrists, pulling me so close I could feel his breath over my face. “None of that,” he murmured.

Yoongi led me to the bed in the corner and lay me down, nudging my thighs apart with a knee before he lay between my legs, his hard, throbbing length pressing against my folds. He rocked back and forth, the tip rubbing deliciously against my clit, and I cried out from the intense pleasure that shot through me.

He silenced me with a deep, passionate kiss, shoving his tongue into my cavern. I wrapped my lips around the muscle, sucking slightly, knowing it would drive him crazy. He let out an appreciative grunt and thrust his hips into mine, forcing a gasp from me.

He lifted his hips, the sudden loss of pressure making me whine, but he pressed a finger against my lips, shushing me. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of you,” Yoongi said, deftly flipping us over so I straddled him. He grasped my thighs and guided me to the point where my core sat right above his perfect, pink mouth. Lifting his head, he licked a strip from the bottom of my folds to my clit, eliciting a loud moan from me. I began panting as he continued his handiwork, skillfully tonguing at me from every delicious angle, finally shoving the muscle as deep as he could go, making me cry out. He went between that and sucking fervently at my clit, and I felt my thighs begin to tremble as he worked me to my breaking point. “Yoongi,” I gasped. “I’m gonna… I mean, I’m going to-”

He groaned at my words, the vibration going straight into my core and pushing me over the edge. I cried out, my moans whiny and loud, as I released onto his tongue, panting his name as I came down from my high. “Yoongi… Yoongi…”

Only letting me have a second to breath, Yoongi speedily flipped us over once more, lying between my legs and pressing his hard, thick length into me before I had time to figure out what was happening. I felt my muscles stretching to accommodate him, relishing in the way my walls clenched around him and made him squinch his eyes shut as he bottomed out. “Ready?” he asked, letting his facial features relax into a smile.

I nodded. Yoongi wasted no more time, thrusting in and out of me at an insanely fast pace, using one hand to hold my hips still and the other to tightly grip the round flesh of my ass. I knew there’d be bruises in the shape of his fingers tomorrow, but at this moment, I didn’t care if I wouldn’t be able to walk. All I knew is I wanted him, I wanted him from the second he picked up his brush, and finally our bodies were melding together as one.

“Harder,” I hissed, scraping my nails down his back.

He obliged, speeding up to a pounding pace. I could hardly breath or feel anything but him inside me, thrusting in and out, the sudden, intense pressure of him inside me coupled with that same pressure abruptly releasing giving me nothing but raw, acute pleasure. I felt the muscles around my core and the bottom of my spine tightening, preparing for a second release. Yoongi’s grunts were coming out loud and frequent, letting me know he too was close. “C’mon sweetheart, let me feel you,” he moaned, and that was all it took to send me over the edge once more, my muscles completely contracting around him as they shook, clenching and unclenching.

He kept going, pushing me through my high, sweat making the tips of his soft, dark hair damp. Finally, Yoongi let out a low, deep grunt and pushed deep into me. I could feel him twitching, releasing everything he had deep inside me. He collapsed on top of me, both of us trying hard to catch our breath as we came down.

After a moment, he pulled out of me and rolled over onto his side. Yoongi smirked as he panted, his face still shiny with perspiration. “Maybe I should let you watch me paint more often.”

[entwinedmoon]

John Torrington: A Portrait of the Stoker as a Young Man

(Previous posts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

Different forms of art have depicted Torrington in different ways. In my last post I discussed how in music Torrington seems to be depicted as either some sort of restless spirit or reanimated man-out-of-time, with a focus on his death and the eerie undead appearance of his mummified body. There’s not much of a focus on what he was like when he was alive, with the inspiration for these works coming from the image of his dead body. Sadly, we don’t have any pictures of what he looked like when he was alive, but that doesn’t mean people haven’t tried to imagine it. In fact, Torrington’s depiction in visual artworks often focus more on what he was like when he was alive, with various attempts at reconstructing what he may have looked like before he died and was buried on Beechey.

One of the first attempts at recreating what he may have looked like comes from the Nova documentary “Buried in Ice.” At the very end of the documentary, there are artistic reconstructions of Torrington, Hartnell, and Braine. I’m not entirely sure who the artist was, but the credits list an illustrator, Wayne Schneider, and he may have been the one to draw these. I can’t find the illustrations outside of the documentary, so please forgive the bad quality of the screenshot I had to use below.

Here we have a John Torrington who looks aged before his time. He was only twenty when he died, but judging by the state of his lungs, he probably had a hard life, so he may have looked much older than his years. This is a very serious-looking Torrington, as if he were standing for a portrait or daguerreotype for several minutes and had to stay completely still.

This drawing also gives him almost shoulder-length hair. Owen Beattie was a technical consultant on the documentary, so he probably had a say in what the recreations of the Beechey Boys may have looked like. This makes me think that the hair length shown here is most likely how long his hair actually was. Yes, I know, I’m going on about his hair again, but due to the confusion over what his hair looked like, it tends to vary across artistic depictions, as we shall see.

Another thing of note in this recreation is the noticeable lines around his mouth. In the pictures of Torrington’s mummified body, there are prominent lines around his mouth, but how much of that was due to postmortem distortions and how much would have shown on his face in life is hard to know. The artwork above is not an official forensic facial reconstruction, and even official reconstructions are highly subjective, so this is just one possible interpretation.

There’s another artistic interpretation of Torrington from around the same time. Remember the children’s book Buried in Ice? Well, what’s a kid’s book without some illustrations?

Now that’s the face of a man who got sick of backbreaking, lung-destroying labor in Manchester and said, “Screw it, I’m going to the Arctic.” The hair here is similar to that depicted in the documentary illustration, but the lines around his mouth are softened. The illustrations for this book were done by Janet Wilson, and she brought a liveliness to Torrington’s face that the somber drawing from the documentary greatly lacked. He still has a slightly careworn face, but he looks closer to his actual age. Janet Wilson also did wonderful detailing on the shirt that he was buried in, which he is wearing in her drawing. The kerchief tied around his head in death is here tied around his neck—and I love the inclusion of the blue border around the kerchief, which is not really noticeable in the photos from his exhumation but is noted in the reports on his burial clothes.

I’m fond of this picture because it gives Torrington some personality beyond that of a sad, tragic victim. It makes him seem like a real person who lived, with a bit of a sly and carefree attitude. He also gives off a kind of back alley salesman vibe, like he knows a guy who knows a guy who could sell you a kidney. But I especially like it because he’s smiling as he’s speaking, and after seeing picture after picture of Torrington’s frozen death grimace, I would love to know what he looked like when he smiled.

There’s another artistic reconstruction which I found on YouTube. It’s by artist M.A. Ludwig, who has a YouTube channel (under the name JudeMaris) dedicated to facial reconstructions of various historical figures, including all three of the Beechey Boys. Here’s Ludwig’s interpretation of what Torrington may have looked like:

He looks much younger here than in either of the two previous interpretations. This John Torrington looks like a young man ready for adventure, with hopes and dreams of a long future. He has slightly shorter hair in this interpretation, but also, he’s blond. I’ve noticed confusion online about the color as well as length of Torrington’s hair, with a lot of people these days thinking he’s blond. I think that may have something to do with the wood shavings he’s resting on in photos, which as I discussed in a previous post, some people have confused for his hair. I’ve also encountered a few versions of the usual photos of him where the lighting looks different, resulting in the few visible wisps of his hair looking much lighter than official reports have described them. Interestingly, the blond hair makes him look younger and gives him an innocent and almost naïve appearance, completely different from the sly, I’ve-got-a-bridge-to-sell-you Torrington from the children’s book.

Now I’m going to move on to an artist who is well known to Franklinites. Kristina Gehrmann (@iceboundterror​) is a German illustrator and graphic artist who specializes in works with a historical or fantasy setting. She has drawn many pictures inspired by the Franklin Expedition, and I have bought several of them from her shop on Etsy, including three different versions of the ships Terror and Erebus sailing in the Arctic or caught in the ice. Currently, those three pictures are on my wall next to a large painting I inherited from my grandparents of two non-Franklin-related ships that I pretend are Terror and Erebus anyway (I call this wall The Boat Place). Gehrmann also wrote and illustrated a graphic novel in German about the Franklin Expedition, Im Eisland, published in three parts and available through Amazon. But if, like me, you don’t speak German, Gerhmann has made an English translation, titled Icebound, available for free here.

Gehrmann has actually drawn two slightly different versions of Torrington, one of which is more like the artistic reconstructions shown above and the other is of a fictionalized Torrington in the graphic novel Im Eisland. I love both of her interpretations, but they are of two different styles. Let’s start with the graphic novel version.

Im Eisland uses a manga-like style, so this version of Torrington is based in that. It gives him a wide-eyed, youthful—and joyful—appearance (when he isn’t dying of consumption, of course). This is the happiest and liveliest Torrington I’ve seen. The manga art style results in some simplified features and a rather modern hairstyle, but there’s nothing wrong with using some artistic license to better convey the personality of a character.

Gerhmann’s other illustration of Torrington is possibly my favorite, even if it might not be the most accurate:

This is a lovely illustration, and it really plays up Torrington’s youth, making him look almost angelic. I’m going to be completely honest—he is very pretty. This version of Torrington is an incredibly handsome young lad, and if Torrington really looked like this, then I think he probably would have been very popular in life. I could go on, but I probably shouldn’t.

I also love the amazing detail on the shirt. You may have noticed some slight variations in these recreations when it comes to his shirt, and I think that’s due to the fact that his shirt looks downright complicated in the few pictures we have of it. There are horizontal stripes and vertical stripes. There’s a high collar and buttons and all these folds that it can be hard to see exactly what it looks like, and unfortunately there were no textile experts present during the exhumation, so there was no one to lay out the shirt and take a closer look at it before redressing and burying him. But every time someone gives their best attempt at figuring out the puzzle that is his shirt, I’m happy, and this one looks very close to how it may have actually looked. My one issue with this picture is that his hair is short and blond, which doesn’t fit the description provided in the autopsy report. But the facial features look true, so I tend to overlook that little nitpick.

This version of Torrington, by the way, is probably the most well-known interpretation. In fact, when you search for John Torrington on Google, this picture crops up:

I have even seen online articles about Torrington that use this picture as a reconstruction example. This is in no way an official reconstruction of him, but it is by far the most popular. (And yes, I bought a copy of this picture, too.)

While reconstructions of what Torrington may have looked like when alive are common among artists depicting him, there is some artwork that uses images of his mummified body as inspiration instead. Irish artist Vincent Sheridan has a gorgeous collection of work inspired by the Franklin Expedition. Several of these feature the mummy of John Torrington, including an etching aptly named “John Torrington.”

Torrington appears as a ghostly apparition in many of these prints, alongside the repeated imagery of a skull, two very physical signs of the human cost of the expedition. While most of the bodies of the men lost have yet to be found, their bones scattered or buried across King William Island, Torrington’s body is a stark reminder that this tragedy did happen, and that these men did die, not just vanish off the face of the earth. I’ve described Torrington as the poster boy for the expedition before, and here his death seems to represent the death of everyone who sailed with Franklin, his face a haunting piece of evidence for the fate that met them all.

Now, I’m not entirely sure how best to transition between that solemn reminder of death and this last piece of Torrington-inspired artwork that I would like to mention, so I’m just going to dive in. This next artwork also uses the image of Torrington’s mummy as inspiration, but in a completely different manner from Sheridan’s work. I refer, of course, to the John Torrington plushie.

This adorable little mummy plushie was created by craft artist Nancy Soares, aka sinnabunnycrafts on Etsy (@sinnaminie​). Whether you think a plushie of a mummified body is in good taste or not, you have to agree that this little guy is freakin’ cute. I might be slightly biased, though, because he was originally crafted for a custom request from my sister as a birthday present for me. But now anyone can buy him or his Beechey buddies. This little guy even made a special appearance during John Geiger’s presentation at the Mystic Seaport Museum’s symposium, Franklin Lost and Found.

I think the fact that there’s a plushie of John Torrington is amazing. People used to take pictures of the recently deceased and use their dead loved one’s hair in jewelry to remember them, so this isn’t that different. To me, at least, it’s a memento to honor him, reminding me that Torrington was more than just a boy who died but a boy who once lived as well.

It is also super adorable.

Next: Torrington as depicted in literature. Spoiler alert! He dies. A lot.

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Torrington Series Masterlist

[thecryptidofbravo]

Visiting Friends, Lessons Learned, Part 1

“Roving Amongst the Redwater”

Notes by Dr. Marta Carpools

At first glance the entrance to the Redwater Complex, or the Hold as the inhabitants call it, is particularly unassuming. A small outcrop of reddish brown stone that, if you happen to come close for some reason, opens into half again the width of a medium sized caravan with two people walking on either side, a bus could fit with some room to spare, though if driven very carefully. The descent is almost immediate, and it is only after you have entered the otherwise spacious tunnel that you notice it is not a natural occurrence, but one very cleverly built, with smaller tunnels splitting off like blood vessels up towards, you realize, the nearby farmland that is, apparently, not as abandoned as it seemed while passing. Of course, if you’ve made it this far, you know the land is very much inhabited.

Two kinds of people enter this territory nowadays: Ones who know the Redwater are here, and those who do not. Of the former, it is either friends of one of the Clan members, like ourselves (we being myself and my mentor, Dr. Metro), or those who heard the call of safety under the surface of the world. Of the more numerous latter it is, at best, on accident, at worst a band of ner-do-wells

Regardless of which you are, you will not be alone in this area for long, I have discovered. It was not half an hour after crossing the south-eastern border on the map (provided by friends within the Black Diamond Trading Company) that two figures trotted up to us from the west, in the direction of the lake north of what was once Bravo.

They moved with a predator’s grace, and I was reminded strongly of the gorehounds I’d seen at the Iron Harbor. I will blame their covered forms for my immediate instinct to depersonify them. I had once thought Wandering Eye’s layers of scarves and leather were impressive, but I realize now that is the look of a lascarian who has spent much time above the surface, and has, however little, adapted to the light. These figures instead wore the full regalia of people accustomed to darkness below ground and moonless nights, layers upon layers of cloth and metal covered leather, hung with hardened leather leaves and small metal trinkets I knew enough to recognize as Memories and Clan marks. It made them seem less living being and more a moving statue. It was impossible to tell build or shape looking at them, and if it weren’t for one being a head and shoulders shorter than the other I’d be inclined to believe they were twins, or some cloning experiment of the Darwins.

I have been interested in these people since learning about them from the aforementioned part-time resident of Bravo, Wandering Eye, or as I have learned since visiting him in the Sunless Garden, ‘Gangarani’eygr’. I will continue calling him Wandering Eye so as to avoid any accidental insult. As such, I hope to make as accurate a description as possible of what I witness within their territory.

With that in mind the two figures cut an impressive portrait, the afternoon sun throwing their shadows long over the sparse grass and rocky sand. They each carried a shield and spear, though the taller had a sword strung on his back, the shorter several knives strapped to her (I would learn later it was a woman) clothing.

The shields were small, by Bravo standards where one could easily be used as a door. Still, the ovals of wood and scrap metal was tall enough to cover shoulder to knee, nearly as tall as myself, though I am by my own admission, not the most gifted in height. Each was carved and painted in whorls and glyphs, their true meaning a mystery to me even now, though I might assume they were ownership marks, or religious in origin, if I knew less of their culture. I am told that while the Runner sect, as I have learned they belonged to, does not have as extensive a glyph system as the Keepers to which I have become marginally better acquainted, they still guard it closely and have many symbols they consider important.

The spears were 3-4feet of a dark hardwood, though I could not tell you the species (perhaps cedar? Oak? I am less well versed in flora than anatomy, unfortunately.). They seemed burnt black, yet glistened like volcanic glass. I am unsure what process is used to create this effect, but it is striking nonetheless. The tips were worked metal, a long blade with a flat front edge, and a concave back, still sharp. I have done my best to recreate the design below:

We stopped as they approached, and Metro made sure his weapons were secure on his belt before holding his own shield to the side and raising his other hand to show he meant no harm. I did the same, for all I lacked any weapons to secure. They showed no response while they closed. I felt the distinct impression they wouldn’t have reacted had we leveled any manner of defense against them. We were strangers here, they were the ones to be afraid of, though there were only two of them. It was then I remembered some old wisdom from back home:

‘For every lascarian above ground, you can be certain a half dozen lurk somewhere nearby, hidden, waiting for the signal to join their friend.’

I will admit I felt a shiver of trepidation at that thought, the kind I was learning well out here in the world beyond the Killscout compound. However hospitable Wandering Eye had seemed in town, I remembered well first meeting him, and the eyes of a hunter he hid behind his glasses. I felt the same look from these two, though perhaps it was my imagination at the time.

Within Bravo, where they were outnumbered by almost every other strain of post-humanity and generally well behaved, where stories of a pack overrunning a caravan and leaving only chewed bones behind were more joke than serious worry, I think it was easy to forget lascarians are some of the most dangerous creatures living in our shared world.

That fact was very clear to me as the two split and circled us, one to the back, and the other to the front. The shorter spoke in heavily accented speech and after a terse moment we were being escorted towards the north.

Our journey through the entrance described above was largely un-notable, beyond those things already noted. We crossed paths with a few other Redwater at the entrance, and I was surprised to see a slow and small, but steady stream of other strains moving about the side tunnels with lascarian guides to destinations unknown.

Following their lead, the taller of our escorts split down one of the tunnels while the shorter continued with us, stopping briefly at a small chamber to remove their outer layers and head-gear. It was here I discovered our escort was a lascarian woman named Whispering Storm, who was by happy coincidence an old friend of Wandering Eye, and had heard our names from him. Her partner, the silent Blood-of-Oaks, had returned to their patrol group while she sorted out getting us access to the Hold.

While I am not an expert on lascarian physiology to know whether the Redwater are typical of their strain, I admit surprise at the variance I was seeing among them.

Wandering Eye, for example, is a towering man with broad shoulders and midsection, bearing the long arms I have generally associated with such individuals of his strain. His bearded features are rounded, though they bear some of the raptor like qualities of the greater lascarian community, especially in the eyes and brow. His teeth of course are quite standard for the species. On the rare occasion I have seen his head uncovered I’ve noted his close cropped hair, and the slight downturned point of his ears, a trait I hadn’t associated with other lascarians and thought previously to be perhaps an individual mutation of some sort.

By contrast, Whispering Storm, though she too bore the eyes and ears of our mutual friend, was a more slender and well-muscled figure, of decidedly average height. Her hair was dark, a blue tinged black I’m not positive was natural, and long, though the sides of her head were shaved and its length was kept in thin, beaded braids gathered behind her head. I noticed a few Memory trinkets were woven in among them.

Both were of course paler than the fairest strain born above ground, almost corpselike, in fact. Whispering Storm, however, though she also bore the nearly familiar facial marks of a Redwater Clan member (three wavy lines over the right eye, a half circle and line over the left), was a study in culture all on her own; her skin, as she changed into what was apparently more common garb for meandering through the Hold, was seemingly covered in scarring, some of which appeared to be done intentionally, even artistically, and the ink of many tattoos, giving her the appearance of a sketchbook sewn into a living creature.

I’m unsure exactly how much of her skin was modified in such a way, but most of what I saw, and I saw much of it, seemed to be. The clothing she changed into was, I admit, more comfortable looking than my own (though I’ve never felt particularly burdened by them), however I felt some small desire to wrap a blanket around her lest she catch a cold. I suppose I should acknowledge she seemed wholly unaffected by the chill I’d begun feeling in the air as we moved further under the earth.

Metro and I exchanged glances, I noticed a slight blush on his cheeks and he averted his eyes from mine while she placed her knives around the form fitting, dark brown leather harness that made up a significant percentage of her new shirt, the rest consisting of a very soft looking linen that left her shoulders, back, and midriff bare. Her legwear had also been exchanged from the unbleached, durable fabric she’d worn above ground to a deep green pair of pants that looked to be of similar material as her upper garment, tucked down into the boots that seemed the one piece of clothing she had not replaced.

During this time I should not fail to mention she had attempted small talk with us, and I discovered she was quite friendly, especially compared to her partner. She kept up a dialogue with us, somewhat less effective than intended due to her unfamiliarity with the language, and continued asking questions and answering a few of our own even as we departed and continued on our way.

I cannot verify the distance from our changing room to the great Gate, but I can say it was many steps, and at least two surprisingly sharp turns. The side tunnels gradually became smaller, and fewer in number, and the main had ceased to appear like a natural opening of rock, instead squaring off at the corners, creating a smooth floor and ceiling. The torches that had lit the early stages of the journey became fewer and far between, casting our path in shadows. It was almost surprise when I realized the sounds of echoed footsteps had grown beyond our own, and I saw my first glimpse of the Gate.

It was a massive thing, a wall of stone and metal, reach across the fill width of the tunnel, and almost to the ceiling, several times my height at this point. I saw figures moving at the top, and in the center was a thick metal door, currently open, and seemingly built to slide sideways rather than inwards or outwards. Through it, and beyond, opened a cavern that stretched to the left into darkness, though I could make out the shapes of a few caravans, mostly pick-me-up trucks and iron horses, though at least one larger ride was present.

Passing through the Gate was a simple process, there being only a small crowd in the area, and most were waved through without issue. Whispering Storm called out to one of the guards in their native tongue, and he nodded, replying with an air of routine, and a few minutes later we found ourselves moving through the entry cavern, and on a stone road, moving deeper into the cavern, where small buildings seemed to grow out of the rock walls. Almost immediately two things became apparent:

One, this place was far larger than the current population could fill. There was no shortage of individuals, most lascarian, though I saw plenty other faces blended into the populous. Hundreds currently wander the underground center of Redwater culture by my estimate, and yet there seemed to be room for hundreds, several hundreds, more. For every building I saw signs of life (a candle in the window, polished tools on a workbench, or just the lack of feeling empty) there were three or more that I was surprised didn’t have boarded windows and an inch of dust on the steps.

Secondly, the city exuded a sense of age that made no sense for a home built within the last year, as I’d been told it had been. It wasn’t just the scope of the Hold, though it was in part the feeling a year could not have been long enough to build such a place. The subtle differences in certain blocks, how buildings grew together, and the shape of them, all felt as though I was walking through an oldcestor history book.

I stamped down on the unease I felt, as we roamed the streets behind Whispering Storm. I told myself I had no idea what determined lascarians in large numbers could accomplish. Wandering Eye had said once that the Holdlings outnumbered the other sects combined twice over, and their very purpose was to build and maintain their home. I still could not shake the feeling of age the place held, though it lessened somewhat as I began to see signs of scaffolding and incomplete buildings the more turns we took.

Perhaps it is only that they build their home out of the bones of the earth that causes the sensation.

My introspection was cut short as we rounded another street, and came to a junction of buildings that moved into a new part of the Hold. The ceiling was lower here, coming almost to the roofs of the buildings, where it did not replace them entirely. The streets began twisting on themselves, creating alleys and alcoves of dwellings. In the distance I was able to make out the shadows of three larger structures, the size of warehouses, just a bit taller than the rest of the buildings. They seemed identical from the vague look I could get, and faced different directions. The effect walking through this new area of the Hold left me feeling somewhat claustrophobic, I confess.

At asking what this place was, Whispering Storm answered we had entered “Ward-way-air-stad”, and at the looks on our faces I suppose, added “Keeper District” a second later.

I commented about the feel of the place, and she nodded, with a slight smile, replying that the Keepers like tunnels. I suppose that makes sense.

Lascarians like tunnels, everyone knows that.

Three turns and a small hill (there are hills underground, I have learned) passed us, and we entered a small lane. On our left was a slightly larger building that created the last turn, on our journey. It seemed empty but had the feel of a temporary state, as though it was normally inhabited. To our right small homes broke up the wall of the cavern.

Small lamps were hung from the places the buildings met in this part of town, and unlike the torches and candles of the earlier parts of the Hold, the light pulsed a pale blue color. I paused to examine one and discovered they weren’t lamps at all, but small, glass covered, stone planters full of mushrooms and moss from which the light came from. Small insects darted about the light-gardens, themselves bursting in tiny sparks of gold and green intermittently, sometimes taking flight towards one of the other holders.

At the end of the alley we found a surprisingly idyllic scene: a dwelling facing the street, built into the back wall of the cavern as it bent left. Between the building and the one closest to its right was a small elevated slab, from which a simple fountain emerged from the cavern rock. Over it was a wooden framework, hanging with more moss and mushrooms as grew in the lamps. Underneath it all, at a small table sat Wandering Eye, writing in a leather bound book.

He stood as we approached, and smiled. I almost didn’t recognize him uncovered by scarves or hat, I’m embarrassed to confess. He, too, was dressed simply and comfortably. In light brown trousers, and only a draping green vest, which fell to his knees but left his arms bare. It was the first time I’d seen him uncovered so, and I was surprised at the number of scars that mottled his skin, though unlike Whispering Storm, none of these seemed to be done intentionally. Most prominent was the burn on the inside of his left forearm, a wound I recognized from two weeks past, when we were in Bravo for the last time together.

Before Metro or myself could reach him, Whispering storm moved forward, and pulled his head down to hers, touching their foreheads together and whispering something that sounded like “essayo”, before promptly hitting his shoulder hard with the back of her hand and unleashing a stream of words in their language while gesturing at the aforementioned arm.

Wandering Eye took it in stride, and waved her off with a few quiet words and a gestured at the two of us. She mad a noise somewhere between a sigh and a growl, a sound I realized in that moment I’d heard often from our mutual friend, and marched into his home while he stepped up and pulled us both into a hug, motioning to the seats around the table he’d been sitting at, to join him.

We’d only just sat and begun to exchange pleasantries when Whispering Storm reappeared, throwing a bandage roll at her Clan-mate, and glaring at him as she took a seat at his side. He picked it up from where it had bounced off of him and made a quick hand gesture that she gave a satisfied nod at.

Marta Marta

-

“Marta?” Wandering Eye asked for the third time, with no little amount of amusement in his voice.

The small rover woman jerked her head up from where she’d been scribbling in her notebook, then looked back long enough to scratch out a line before closing it with a smile and turning her attention to the rest of the handful of individuals in the room.

“Yes! Sorry! I wanted to get everything written down before I forgot,” She blurted out.

He waved the apology aside, with a freshly wrapped arm. “Do you want tea?”

[ntrending]

Here’s the uncomfortable truth about George Washington’s ‘wooden’ teeth

New Post has been published on https://nexcraft.co/heres-the-uncomfortable-truth-about-george-washingtons-wooden-teeth/

Here’s the uncomfortable truth about George Washington’s ‘wooden’ teeth

George Washington faced many challenges regarding his teeth. (National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC/)

We have all heard the tales about George Washington chopping down a cherry tree, throwing a silver dollar across the Potomac Rive, and, of course, wearing wooden teeth.

They are all just myths, but one thing is certain: The father of our country suffered horribly with dental pain. Today, the dental profession has many ways to relieve dental pain and to replace missing teeth so that they look and feel like natural ones. Unfortunately for Washington, 18th-century dentistry could not provide the much sought-after relief from dental suffering available today.

I am a professor of dentistry who has studied the history of Washington’s teeth and have found it very interesting separating fact from fiction regarding Washington’s oral health.

The myth of the wooden teeth

George Washington by Charles Willson Peale. The swollen cheek and a slightly visible scar could have been due to an abscessed tooth in the young soldier. (Charles Willson Peale/)

While it is a myth that Washington’s false teeth were made out of wood, his pain and embarrassment from his dental woes were all too real. What might have led people to believe that Washington’s teeth were made from wood was the brownish stain on his denture teeth, which was most likely the result of tobacco use or stain-inducing wine.

Washington is best remembered for his heroics against the British in the American Revolution, but he started his military career in the Virginia Militia fighting alongside the British during the French and Indian War. Washington’s dental problems likely started during that time. It was also about this time that he wrote to his brother that “I heard the bullets whistle, and, believe me there is something charming in the sound.”

But Washington had more than bullets and war on his mind. Washington at that time also wrote in his diary that he had paid five shillings to a “Doctor Watson” for the extraction of a tooth. During the war, Washington purchased dozens of toothbrushes, tooth powders and pastes, and tinctures of myrrh. Unfortunately for Washington, his dedication to his dental health did not prevent the dental suffering he would endure throughout his life.

In an attempt to both flatter Washington and thank him for liberating Boston from the British in 1776, John Hancock commissioned the great portrait artist Charles Willson Peale to produce a painting of Washington. Peale created a masterpiece that shows a scar on Washington’s left cheek, which is said to have resulted from an abscessed tooth.

Washington’s cousin, Lund Washington, served as the temporary manager of the Mount Vernon estate during the American Revolution. While George Washington was in Newburgh, New York on Christmas Day, 1782, he penned a letter to Lund.

In this letter, George Washington asked Lund to look into a drawer of his desk at Mount Vernon where he had placed two small front teeth. We do not know who the original owners of these two teeth were, but it could have been one of several slaves’ teeth that Washington purchased over the years. At this time, Washington’s dentist was Dr. Jean-Pierre Le Mayeur, who had many wealthy patients and was known for his practice of paying individuals for their healthy teeth to be used in the construction of dentures for his wealthy patients. Selling teeth to dentists was an accepted way of making money at the time.

At the time of Washington’s death, 317 slaves lived at Mount Vernon. A simple notation in the Mount Vernon plantation ledger books for 1784 may reveal the source of some of Washington’s denture teeth. The notation simply reads: “By cash pd Negroes for 9 Teeth on Acct of Dr. Lemoin.” (Lemoin is the same person as Le Mayeur.) Historians also do not know for certain whether those teeth ended up in Washington’s dentures.

A man of few teeth, and words

Washington’s dental health even affected his two presidential inaugurations. Washington first took the oath of office of the president of the United States on April 30, 1789 on the second-floor balcony of Federal Hall. At this time, Washington had only one natural tooth remaining.

Dr. John Greenwood was a well-known dentist who practiced in New York City. Dr. Greenwood made a denture for Washington in 1789. The denture was made from carved hippopotamus ivory, human teeth and brass nails—no wooden teeth! Dr. Greenwood made a hole in the denture so the denture would slip snugly over the one remaining tooth—his lower left first premolar—and provide some retention. This tooth would eventually need to be extracted by Dr. Greenwood, who placed this tooth into a locket attached to a pocket watch and chain. Both the locket and the denture now reside in Manhattan’s New York Academy of Medicine.

Washington was very self-conscious about his dentures and considered them to be a sign of weakness, which could be seen as a threat to the credibility of the youthful nation. So, rather than delivering the first inaugural address to the assembled masses lining the streets in front of Federal Hall, Washington retired to the privacy of the Senate chamber, where he delivered his address to the members of Congress.

On March 4, 1793, Washington delivered his second inaugural address in the Senate chamber of Congress Hall in Philadelphia, and his dentures were causing him much pain and difficulty. His speech is still the shortest inaugural address in history, lasting only two minutes and consisting of only 135 words—shorter even than Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

Bulging lips

In honor of #PresidentsDay, here’s an inside look at George Washington’s lower denture and last remaining tooth that are part of our Library’s collections, via @untappedcities: https://t.co/6fdObyid2T pic.twitter.com/1jswSTtzAF

— The New York Academy of Medicine (@NYAMNYC) February 18, 2019

Gilbert Stuart produced what would become the most well-recognized portrait of any American president to this day. Stuart, born in Rhode Island, lived in London and Dublin for 12 years, where he mastered the techniques which would produce over 1,100 portraits during his prolific career. Stuart returned to America with the intent of making his fortune by producing a portrait of the hero of the American Revolution, George Washington.

The only problem with Stuart’s ambitious plan was that he did not know Washington. However, a letter of introduction from Chief Justice John Jay led to Washington agreeing to sit for a session, in 1795, at Stuart’s Philadelphia studio. Washington’s face was sunken from the poor facial support provided by his ill-fitting dentures. Stuart placed cotton in Washington’s mouth, and the resulting portrait became known as the “Vaughan” portrait, as it was purchased by Samuel Vaughan, who was a London merchant and a close personal friend of Washington. Stuart went on to make 12 to 16 copies of the Vaughan painting, until Washington agreed to sit for another portrait.

In 1796, Washington sat for that other portrait, which became known as the “Athenaeum” portrait, a version of which appears today on the one-dollar bill. In this portrait, Stuart captured the bulge in Washington’s lips from his dentures, making his lips considerably swollen.

Myths and legends concerning all aspects of Washington’s life have become part of American lore, but even this iconic figure of American history could not escape the misery of poor dental health.

William Maloney is a Clinical Associate Professor of Dentistry, New York University. This article was originally featured on The Conversation.

Written By By William Maloney/The Conversation

[katebushwick]

The second mode of apprehension, nonauthentic and shocking, is exemplified by a YouTube user with the handle omgtkseth, posting in the comments field of a Getty Museum (2012) film clip that explained the research behind the Gods in Color project. In response to a question from handle MILITARcz about why the statues struck some people as unrealistic or kitschy, omgtkseth wrote: Because of the materials, perhaps. Im [sic] a little familiar with canvas painting, and one notices how certain colors are unachievable depending on your paint type. Perhaps the colors are based on natural paintings made with fruits and flowers of the area. But I agree they arent [sic] very pretty. They are very bright and many colors are mixed. Like a nerdy girl dressing with rainbow leggings and so on. . . . I would have used a soft copper for the scales. Having demonstrated his or her credibility in painting and pigments, omgtkseth focuses on the implausibility of the materials used to produce the Gods in Color statues. Omgtkseth knows that “certain colors are unachievable,” particularly if the colors are derived from plant and other nature-given matter. The statues are also shocking (“arent [sic] very pretty . . . very bright and many colors are mixed”). The painted statues, according to this viewer, are nonauthentic (because the way in which the pigments were produced is suspect) and shocking (garish and too bright). Within the basic modes of apprehension there was a range of opinion about the color, from generally positive through neutral/curious, skeptical/negative, and hostile. The strongest theme to emerge, however, was ambivalence. Many respondents were caught between appreciating the science behind the polychrome and disliking the finished product. This position is especially evident in the comments by readers who selectively endorsed the polychrome—in other words, they liked some of the painted pieces but not all of them. Reader “flapperlife,” writing in an online chatroom about the Gods in Color show, confessed: I think the sculptures showing the human anatomy look better without color. I feel like the color would take away the full effect of the presentation of the body. [T]hat being said, I think some of the other sculptures are equally as lovely with color. The lion sculpture really stood out to me as something that color enhances.12 Flapperlife accepts the color per se but does not think it works on all of the pieces. There are limits, it would seem, to the acceptable reach of colored paints. “Scholars give us antiquity—the colorized version,” went one headline, but the issue was not just that antiquity had been given a splash of paint (Gewertz 2007). The intensity of the color, and its alien presence in cherished aesthetic terrain, proved too much for some. “Wrong, Wrong, Wrong”: Painted Marble The Gods in Color caused a sensation when it toured the United States and Europe.13 The exhibit featured painted casts based on Greek and Roman figures: gods, mythical characters, heroes, statesmen, and ordinary people. The statues provided a stark contrast with popular images of pristinely white, marble classical sculptures (Figure 1).14 The director of the National Archaeological Museum of Athens, which hosted Gods in Color in early 2007, summarized his guests’ reactions thus: “Some [visitors] like it, because they did not know [about the color] and it was a discovery. Some are disappointed. [They] have said to me personally, ‘You have completely ruined the image we had of antiquity.’”15 On YouTube, a film clip of Vinzenz Brinkmann demonstrating his UV raking light technique generated this comment from a viewer: “Interesting, but I’m really glad that paint went away over the ages!” (Getty Museum 2012). And a reviewer of the exhibition’s installation at the Sackler Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts, from late 2007 through early 2008, confessed that although he was fascinated by the objects, “All this color feels wrong, wrong, wrong” (Cook 2007). What were they upset about? We can consider, as a starting point, the portrait of Augustus from Prima Porta (Figure 2). The original statue was discovered in Rome in 1863 near the ruins of a villa associated with Livia, the Emperor Augustus’s wife (Liverani 2004). Scholars identified the statue as a portrait of Augustus, the first emperor of Rome, on the basis of stylistic features and iconographic clues, including the Eros and dolphin at his feet (both serving as visual reminders of Augustus’s immortal ancestress Venus) (Fittschen 1991; Hausmann 1981; Schmaltz 1981). The Gods in Color version presents a festively adorned man with bright red lips. The eyes are carefully painted and framed with eyebrows and long eyelashes. Pigment free, the emperor is the model of omnipotence, severity, and divine detachment. Under colored paints, he is simultaneously human and alien, awesome and vulnerable. Each of the pieces in the Gods in Color exhibition was a provocation to received wisdom about the classical aesthetic. Even so, there was something especially jarring about the Prima Porta Augustus. Here was one of the most recognizable images of Western antiquity—the face of the young Empire, harbinger of eternal Rome—utterly transformed (Zanker 1998). As generations of young classical archaeologists have been taught, the Prima Porta Augustus exemplifies the imperator’s masculine virtue through its “neatly arranged hair and with facial features . . . classically calm” (Pollini 2012:175). But the classical calm dissipates beneath the painter’s brush. The red and blue paints on the breastplate turn an arcane set of mythical images into a graphic novel whose characters leap off the surface (on the ambiguity of the meaning of the images, see Squire 2013). According to the team of art historians, classical archaeologists, and chemists who worked on the exhibit, this is how the Prima Porta Augustus originally looked: “Everything irrespective of function was colored in the same lively colors. The sculptor conceived the three dimensional form which he chiseled out of the stone always with a view to the coloring” (Brinkmann 2007:29; see also Brinkmann and Koch-Brinkmann 2010; Kader 2009). Critics, nonetheless, saw red. Scholarly fights over painted marble have a long history (Bradley 2009). In the late eighteenth century, German art historian J. J. Winckelmann popularized the idea that Greek and Roman marble sculptures were intended to be white. Winckelmann linked white marble with purity and natural form, the very definition of beauty in the Enlightenment period. His moralistic teachings on marble statuary found material justification in later scholarship. In ancient Greece and Rome, marble was a luxury material that was expensive and difficult to obtain. Covering white marble sculpture with colorful paints would therefore have been a symbolically destructive act. But even as Winckelmann’s ideas were taking root among European scholars and connoisseurs, contrary evidence mounted. Fresh archaeological discoveries showed that Greek and Roman sculptures, along with temples, had in fact been finished with bright paints.16 By 1835, when the British Museum established a special committee on the question of color in classical sculpture, the debate over painted marble raged across the continent (Jenkins and Middleton 1988).17 At stake was the moral basis not just of classical culture but also of nineteenth-century Europeans’ pretenses to classicizing progress (Hamilakis 2007; Hoock 2010; Rose-Greenland 2013). It is now generally accepted that Greek and Roman marble statues and public buildings were finished in such a way that their surfaces were polychromatic. Scholars interpret this finishing treatment, moreover, as having been integral to the meaning of the objects (Palagia 2006; Walter-Karydi 2007). But while many scholars agree that metal attachments, fabric, floral crowns, and targeted (but limited) paints were used to dramatize the visual impact of the statues and buildings, what remains controversial is the specific idea that marble was painted (Bradley 2009, 2014:189–90). The Gods in Color exhibit revealed the rawness of this controversy. Despite the painstaking efforts of the statues’ makers to support the color reconstruction with scientific and archaeological evidence, they failed to convince their audience to believe what they were seeing. Color as Material At the heart of the Gods in Color project were two tasks: identifying paint traces, or “ghosts,” (Harvard University Art Museums curator Susanne Ebbinghaus, quoted in Reed 2007) on the surface of Greek and Roman marble statues and recreating the original paints using the same ingredients, ratios, tools, and techniques of the ancient ateliers. To achieve these tasks, the men and women involved in the project used sophisticated equipment—a point repeatedly stressed in the Gods in Color catalogue, museum didactic boards, and affiliated scholarly publications. In their essay “On the Reconstruction of Antique Polychromy Techniques,” published in the edited volume that served as a scholarly complement to the exhibition catalogue, Brinkmann and Koch-Brinkmann (2010) wrote, About four years ago, our efforts in this area [color reconstruction] reached a new scientific and technical height: thanks to the non-contact analyses made possible by UV-VIS absorption spectroscopy and X-ray fluorescence measurement, our understanding of the pigments has become substantially greater and more specific. . . . We can meanwhile adjust the colourants employed for the reconstruction to correspond quite precisely to those of the antique original. (P. 115) Reproducing the colors quite precisely required a degree of ocular precision of which machines are capable but the human eye is not: Due to the fact that UV-VIS absorption spectroscopy is a physical and optical method of measurement, not only can the respective colourant be identified, but the shade exactly defined in a chromatic diagram. As a result, it is possible to determine the hue independently of the individual sensory impression. (Brinkmann, Koch-Brinkmann, and Piening 2010:200) Accompanying this passage are a series of color photographs showing UV-VIS spectrum readings, chromatic diagrams on the x-y axis, and small piles of granular yellow ochre earths at various stages of shading after being burnt. The scientific work behind the statues appears bulletproof: Machines take the readings, locate the color traces, and guide the process of recreating colorants. “Individual sensory impression” is not up to this task but is in fact something to be overcome by technology. In saying so, the researchers offer a preemptive response to critics: Whatever personal taste might dictate, we know we got the science right. For the Gods in Color statues to be faithful re-creations, one more step was required. After the colors were correctly seen, they had to be correctly made: The preparation of the natural pigments through a process of grinding and washing is the prerequisite for attaining paints of a quality and vividness so great that [the sculptures’ subtle] characteristics are still visible today. Especially in the case of the yellow and red ochres, the preparation requires tremendous effort, since the procedure has to be repeated fifteen to twenty times . . . (Brinkmann and Koch-Brinkmann 2010:126) The researchers avoided modern, synthetic paints to the extent possible and drew attention to their effort to recreate the pigments using original, organic materials. At the Institute for Archaeology at Georg-August University in Göttingen, two glass cases displayed the tools and materials of the pigment re-creation. The accompanying labels named the substances (“azurite,” “ochre”) and their places of origin. The unlabeled tools were meant to speak for themselves: raw-wood pestles and mixers and the finished, ground product in small glass dishes. This arrangement of tools stressed the traditional nature of the practices within the precise techniques of science. From the perspective of the Gods in Color researchers, creating the paints properly was the core achievement because it was the only guarantee for knowing the statues properly. The paints were the material of consequence, the true object of scrutiny through the UV-VIS readings and chemical analysis. Why did viewers fail to notice? Ulrike Koch-Brinkmann blamed what she called “Marmorweiss,” a socially constructed sensibility about marble and how it should look, behave, and be thought about.18 Marmorweiss translates into English as “white marble,” but it can also be a word play on “marble wisdom” or “marble sense.” For centuries, marble statues were adorned with paint, jewelry, metal attachments, floral garlands, and clothing. The unpainted version that we know today is an accident of entropy legitimated by Western civic values. With their brightly painted surfaces, the Gods in Color statues challenged this accomplishment. The punch line was that the statues were made of plaster, not marble. Plaster casts of marble statues have been made and displayed for centuries. They allow lifelike replicas to travel widely for study and artistic experimentation (Frederiksen and Marchand 2010). The Gods in Color scientists bracketed the plaster and prioritized the pigments, imagining the end products as historically accurate study pieces. Skeptics, on the other hand, struggled to decouple color from material. Marble Sense and the Impact of Time Why is a particular image of antiquity so important to us—in this case, the one that centers on white marble? There are two aspects to this question. One concerns the lionization of select historical moments. A robust scholarly literature argues that specific events or epochs are narrativized and sometimes romanticized to explain contemporary social structures and project for ourselves an edifying imagined past (Anderson [1983] 1991; Goody 2006; Halbwachs [1950] 1980; Sewell 1996). The second aspect of the question concerns the evolution of the white marble statue as the most visible and iconic symbol of Western civilization. That aspect has received less scholarly attention. Answering it, I argue, begins with material historiography. Statues of people and gods were an everyday sight in ancient Greece and Rome. Their abundance prompted ancient writers to describe statues as the “other population” of Greece and Rome.19 More than mere backdrop elements, statues had important social functions. Sculpted gods directed worship in temples and formed the centerpiece of religious processions. Commemorative statues recalled the deeds of war heroes, philosophers, statesmen, and civic benefactors. Imperial portraits served as a constant reminder of the emperor’s authority. They were, in short, an active, vibrant component of social life. Marble is an ideal material for statue carving. Although statues had long been made from a range of materials (wood, bronze, limestone, and terracotta), by the first century ad, marble had become “the great prestige building material of its time” (Ward-Perkins 1992:23). Materially, marble is softer and less friable than limestone and tufa, making marble amenable to carving cascades of drapery folds and curly hair. Marble is also luminous, a product of its crystalline calcium carbonate content. The crystalline calcium is what gives the surface a glow and makes the sculpture seem alive. With this particular combination of physical and visual qualities, marble was used to create the most important, expensive, and elite statues, reliefs, and monuments. Its preeminence is summed up in the emperor Augustus’s claim that he found Rome a city made of common bricks (latericius) and left it, at his death, a city of marble.20 Augustus granted access to the vast network of imperial marble quarries cautiously and with nepotistic priorities. This example set the pattern for subsequent emperors who treated marble as a prized resource available only through the beneficence of the imperator (Fant 1988:150). The power of marble lay not just in what it stood for (wealth) but also in what it could do materially. The literary record provides rich examples of intense encounters between fleshand-blood people and their marble counterparts. Pliny, the Roman historian, describes the destruction of the late emperor Domitian’s portrait statues: [Domitian’s] countless golden statues, in a heap of rubble and ruin, were offered as fitting sacrifice to the public joy. It was a delight to smash those arrogant faces to pieces in the dust, to threaten them with the sword, and savagely attack them with axes, as if blood and pain would follow every single blow. (Pliny, Panegyricus 52.4–5. Reprinted and translated in Varner 2004:112–3) The mutilation of the statues, writes Varner, “represents the collective destruction of the emperor himself in effigy” (Varner 2004:113). What brought the statues to life, and what led to their death, was color. Pliny describes Domitian’s statues as golden (aureae), meaning they were carved in marble and covered with a thin layer of gold leaf. Pliny’s passage allows us to imagine the contrasting visual impact of the statues as they gleamed in the hot, bright Mediterranean sun, with the charred gold leaf scorching the face in the fire. By Pliny’s time, white marble stood for purity, homogeneity, excellence, and authenticity. These qualities connected directly with the mos maiorum, the mores of the ancestors, which served as the moral absolute among the Romans (Jockey 2013:77). Subsequent imperial iconography alternated colors and whiteness to signal different aspects of the subject (Bradley 2009). But a new moral weight was assigned to white marble. As painted marble statues lost their color due to natural processes of fading, unpainted marble became the default material state. Natural fading does not produce stark-white surfaces. It produces, rather, dulled shades of the original hues. For this reason, the project of whitening developed its own expertise—scrubbing away the surface impurities, discrediting textual evidence of painted marble, and producing replica study casts using white plaster. The work of lightening and whitening was naturalized, and the whiteness of classical marble statues became a convenient fact for a range of nineteenth-century scholarly arguments. Whiteness signaled humanism, civilizational progress, and moral purity (McClintock 1995). Twentieth-century Color Science and the Correct Polychrome The link between color and cultural values was systematized in early twentieth-century color theory. The most prominent of the American color systems, the one founded by Albert Henry Munsell (1858–1918), pushed beyond the latent chromophobia of classicizing whiteness. On the contrary, Munsellians believed that the right color palette—that is, the careful arrangement of colors within a balanced system—could be beneficial to individual health and social welfare. For example, Munsell urged that “beginners,” including children, should avoid viewing “strong color” because “extreme red, yellow, and blue are discordant. (They ‘shriek’ and ‘swear.’)” (Rossi 2011:4, quoting Munsell 1906). The potential of color to modify group behavior appealed to a broad set of actors in the penal system, government, and private industry, and the Munsell system became a near-ubiquitous technology for standardizing color. In a Munsellian system, colors occurring in nature are inherently correct because perfectly balanced but manufactured colors are wrong for being used in unbalanced combinations and proportions. The same principle applies to Greek and Roman art, which provided a useful teaching example for Munsellian theory since Greek and Roman art predated synthetic, chemical-based dyes and paints. A 1924 article in Color News, an official publication of the Munsell Research Laboratory, accepted that classical sculpture was polychrome: . . . sculptured figures were very generally painted. There are only a few traces of colored pigment found today on any Greek sculpture, but it seems likely that color generally appeared in the hair, the eyes, borders and costumes, and other decorations. (Nickerson 1924:12)21 The Romans used colorful paints, too, and exceeded the ornamental limits of that medium by adding another layer of visual emphasis: Painting was evidently not ornamental enough, for they decorated their sculpture with heavier, more impressive and ornate metal work. (Nickerson 1924:14) The core issue in Munsellian color systems was not whiteness against color but rather natural subtlety against gaudy excess; the high points of ancient art are those moments when artists achieved balance within an established “hue circuit.” The proper balance of “warm” and “cool” within a circuit generated colors pleasing to viewers. In early Greek art, for example, warm reds and yellows were balanced with cool blues and greens, “resulting in a more neutral effect” (Nickerson 1924:5). Neutrality, nuance, and harmony—the very features that Munsellian scientists advocated over modern synthetic palettes—were said to be the hallmarks of Greek painting. Where evidence pointed to bright and bold colors, as in the Parthenon in Athens, the Color News writer denies that the paints were meant to be seen in any detail: “Used as it was, in the upper part of the structure, where one had to look at it from a distance, the effect might be very pleasing. Seen nearer, it might seem rather crude to users of more subtle color” (Nickerson 1924:11). In Roman architecture, by contrast, colorful paints were restricted to the private interior of temples and homes. The public palette was “nearly neutral in color” and “austere”—a decision supposedly explained by the social character of the Roman nation (Nickerson 1924:14). Color, according to Munsellian thought, is a powerful social element, and its best expression is found in balanced systems of hues and tones. No color is “wrong, wrong, wrong” on the face of it; rather, its associated colors give it meaning and logic. The Gods in Color scholars continued this tradition by attempting to correct how we perceive color. Introducing “colorized” antiquity via sculpture, they wanted viewers to accept the colors as part of a historically accurate system of pigments and material practices. Despite their airtight scientific case, the Gods in Color researchers could not dislodge cherished ideas about the culture of antiquity. In that imagined antiquity, the emperor’s new (Technicolor) clothes are a fantasy. “Kitsch”: Scholarly Criticisms I asked Koch-Brinkmann whether, among the negative responses to the exhibit, there was one particular line of criticism that was surprising. Yes, she said, the allegation that our work is ungrounded. Because, of course there were people who just didn’t understand what we were doing and who were never going to accept paint on the statues, but [specific scholars] criticized our method of paint reconstruction. . . . They could not outright deny that [paint] was there. But they hate that we made them. (Interview in Frankfurt, Germany, June 27, 2011) This line of criticism finds its full expression in a review of the exhibition and its accompanying catalogue, published by German classical archaeologist Bernhard Schmaltz. He criticized Brinkmann and Koch-Brinkmann for allowing their imaginations to intrude on rigorous application of their scientific approach (Schmaltz 2005). The crux of the problem, Schmaltz argued, was the researchers’ selective use of evidence. In his discussion of the skin color of the painted statues, for example, he insists that the selected specimens do not present the solid case that Brinkmann and his colleagues want them to. Schmaltz acknowledges that the skin portions of the original sculpture were probably altered in some way to appear lifelike. The question, however, is whether paint was used to achieve this effect and, if so, with what intensity. Doubting the representativeness of the evidence as presented in the catalogue, Schmaltz wrote: Only three examples in the catalogue are considered on their own [the rest are collapsed into groups], and in two of those cases B[rinkmann] wrongly believes that a silver skin finish is present. . . . The examples are not even representative of the range of remaining marble sculpture, as it is for example at the Acropolis. (Schmaltz 2005:26) Citing the Acropolis as a counterexample draws pointed attention to the failings of Brinkmann’s team to look carefully even at the obvious evidence; ancient sculptural evidence does not come more visible or significant than that. Further, The examples (“S.44”) for painted skin from large sculptural pieces are remarkably uneven (bemerkenswert disparat) yet for B. they are completely valid. It is completely questionable why B. didn’t undertake a systematic look at his own catalogue since the whole point to the project is to give a full look at the early classical sculptural evidence. It is a serious omission! (ein schwerwiegendes Versäumnis!) (Schmaltz 2005:26) The problem is not just that the polychrome researchers cherry-picked their evidence or overlooked other cases; according to Schmaltz, they were overly bold with the paints. Even if the scientific instruments were correct in identifying traces of pigment, Schmaltz averred, the scholars failed to provide cultural justification for their particular painted reconstructions. The works were out of step with their imagined Zeitstellung, or time period (Schmaltz 2005:31). The Gods in Color researchers had prepared themselves for skepticism. In the official catalogue, Brinkmann predicted, “This project will be reproached with having ventured into the realm of fantasy”; and, further, “Responses such as ‘primitive’ or ‘kitsch’ will be heard, but this first shock has to be overcome” (Brinkmann 2007:27). Brinkmann and his colleagues remained confident that the weight of scientific evidence behind their project would overcome prejudicial viewing by helping audience members to “learn afresh to accept the coloring of statues as an art form. . . . Twenty years of research, the last ten of them with the aid of color reconstructions, were just long enough for me to master this process” (Brinkmann 2007:27). The ontological basis of Schmaltz’s criticism, however, was essentially cultural rather than epistemic. What Schmaltz did was shift the terrain from materials science—terrain on which the Gods in Color scientists were strong—to cultural history, which was more open to interpretation. He was prepared to accept polychrome statuary to an extent. But he was unconvinced of these specific reconstructions in the cultural matrix of imagined Greco-Roman antiquity. There was something about the painted casts themselves that was perceived as excessive. That same doubt was echoed by Ebbinghaus, albeit in a more positive light: “There is a big difference between this abstract notion [polychrome sculpture] and actually attempting to imagine what the sculptures might have looked like” (Reed 2007). Imagining painted statues was fine; making them into material objects was not, because materialization imposed particular colors on the imaginary landscape. To suggest that the painted statues were illogical in their Zeitstellung is to insist that they do not have a legitimate place in that imaginary landscape and, by extension, in antiquity itself. The Gods in Color scholars sketched a picture of antiquity with ancient texts and archaeological evidence. Circumlitio (Brinkmann, Primavesi, and Hollein 2010), for example, includes an image of a Pompeian wall painting showing a statue of Artemis on a base, brightly colored with yellow, purple, turquoise, and gold paints from head to toe (Figure 3). In the museum guide and on exhibition didactic boards, readers were told of an “abundance of reference to Antique statuary polychromy” (Brinkmann, 2010:15). But the same information was freighted with cautionary notes: Pompeian wall paintings and other such images cannot be treated as records of true depictions of now-missing artworks, for example, and there is the open question of why so many ancient paintings present monochrome, rather than polychrome, statues. The Gods in Color scientists were appropriately circumspect, engaging in the correct form of scholarly dialogue. For Schmaltz and for nonspecialist viewers, however, what was missing was a clear picture of what all of these colored statues meant or did in antiquity. Did those bright reds and blues seem as bold to the ancient viewers as they do to us? Can the scientists’ “paint ghosts” sustain these shocking reproductions?22 And if Augustus really wore such gaudy clothes, does this require revising his historical image? Zeitstellung is not a simple matter of having the right evidence. It is also a matter of how that evidence is presented, particularly if it conflicts with a collectively held image of history. This implies, further, that the careful efforts of the Gods in Color team were irrelevant beyond the simple effect of thrilling the modern museum audience. While the technical goals of the Gods in Color project were to master the observation and re-creation of pigments, the broader epistemic aim was to rethink the sociocultural landscape of antiquity by imagining a riot of colors among the statues. For Schmaltz, the question of kitsch was actually less important than that of fit. A failed Zeitstellung suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of the world that the painted statues were meant to recreate. The achievement of authentic paints and pigments could not overcome that misunderstanding. Extending Schmaltz’s critique beyond the specific question of evidentiary choices, the problem with the Gods in Color statues is that they are only accurate in a particular moment in ancient history—and not necessarily the one we care most about. They are accurate, moreover, in a particular contemporary moment, as the product of current scientific techniques, pigment production, and ways of seeing. Color, intended by the scientists as an empirically grounded historical corrective, became instead an unwanted aesthetic intervention. The colors made plain the fault line between technical accuracy and cultural validity. This brings us to an apparent confirmation of Fleck’s maxim that “only that which is true to culture is true to nature” (Fleck [1935] 1979:35). Discussion and Conclusion Color is grounded in deep cultural meaning. Anthropologist Victor Turner reminds us that color use is socially patterned and reflects basic life-and-death processes and emotions (Turner 1967:88–9). My discussion has highlighted one aspect of color, namely its vulnerability to competing, socially grounded systems of perception. The important point for a sociological theory of color is that even when people are past the “purity” threshold—in this case, their acceptance of a (shocking) new understanding of classical marble statues—there is another set of constraints operating on the tone and hue of the colors. As my data demonstrate, perception is constrained by collective ideas as well as intellectual training. In the Gods in Color case, the salient perceptual systems can be distinguished from each other as empirical and cultural. Both of them sought to make definitive meaning of color by interpreting its application to reworked classical pieces. The Gods in Color show was no ordinary curatorial project. It was an assertion of the central role of science in revealing historical and aesthetic truth. In an age in which science and technology hold sway over many people’s hopes for longevity and powerfully shape a vision of the future, the Gods in Color show suggested that technologically grounded empiricism is needed, too, to correct our vision of the past. The problem for the exhibition’s creators was that the statues had been overhauled to the point where they were no longer recognizable as historically authentic. They were, instead, hybrid creatures straddling Rose-Greenland 99 science and art, struggling to gain credibility (Gieryn 1999). Viewers accepted the basic idea of polychrome sculpture but were turned off by the specific colors used. The colors were too bold. Bright colors and bold color patterns may have a charming ethnic romanticism in Western fashion practice, but they signify persons and practices as nonwhite, socially transgressive, and Other.23 What the Gods in Color viewers seemed to want from their statues was classical authenticity, which is the product of acquired sense and collective wisdom rather than historically or chemically precise renditions. Authenticity, I have argued, operates on two levels. First, from the material point of view, there is the issue of historically accurate ingredients made to produce the pigments. Second, from the point of view of reception, there is the issue of cultural plausibility. Authenticity, in sum, is an outcome of our own experiences and socially cultivated understandings. It is not interchangeable with accuracy. What the case presents is a conflict between scientific and cultural authority mediated at the level of sensory perception and made visible through the addition of color. These two forms of knowledge, the scientific and the cultural, have no inherent relationship. They may be cooperative, as when the rules of science and the frisson of cultural creativity combine to produce high-end modernist cuisine (Borkenhagen 2015; Lane 2014), or, as the present case demonstrates, they may be in conflict. The nature of their relationship varies because science itself can be used in the name of tradition and authenticity (e.g., conserving ancient objects by slowing their rate of decay) or innovation (e.g., remaking the same objects to the way they “really” once were). I have argued that a sociological theory of color must engage with materiality as a multifaceted phenomenon. In the present case, the materiality is two-fold: the substance of the color itself (plants, pigments, chemicals, dyes) and the object to which the color was applied. Each of these elements has meaning and is open to contestations over credibility and meaning. “Marble sense” (Marmorweiss), Koch-Brinkmann’s term for a shared disposition toward marble and its appropriate uses, highlights the importance of material sense more generally. Marmorweiss is rooted in centuries-long processes of natural material decomposition and change as well as social forces of historical mythologizing, institutionalized aesthetics, and conflation of material, color, and norms. With any given cultural object there are several materials at play, and each material is differentially visible and significant according to audience, context, subject matter, and the qualities of the material. Just as materiality is a moving target, so is the setting in which the object is received and perceived (on socially shaped perception of time and symbols, see Zerubavel 1997). Where do we go from here? I suggest two research directions that have potential to strengthen and extend sociological theorizing with color. The first concerns the intersection of color perception and time. Every restored historical object has, simultaneously, two temporal dispositions: past and future. The (newly) painted (ancient) statue, as I have tried to demonstrate, is one object through which the tension between these dispositions came out particularly strongly. The painted statues were an affront to temporality because the rules of Western classicism were changed halfway through the game, without warning or explanation. Taste is a factor here, to be sure, since the high modernism currently in vogue is clean and tends not to be polychromatic (or, when polychrome is called for, it is used judiciously against a monochromatic background). But taste is only part of the explanation. The rules of tasteful erudition clashed with the rules of good science. Where ordinary museumgoers and classics fans saw shocking reproductions of white originals, the Gods in Color researchers looked at white statues and saw a massive historical error. The emotional aspect of this tension—the sense of losing or gaining control over a cherished mental image of a fetishized historical period—merits further development, empirically and theoretically. 100 Sociological Theory 34(2) As a second contribution, the paper calls for renewed thinking about what aesthetic knowledge is and how it operates (Chong 2013; Shapin 2012). New technological tools have opened the door to previously unimaginable feats in reconstruction and conservation work. These achievements pose difficult questions for aesthetic knowledge, primarily because people generally do not like to be told that their admiration for an artwork or building is misplaced because the artwork or building is technically false. When the Sistine Chapel paintings were restored in the 1990s, for example, some art historians severely criticized the restored versions for being garish and distracting (Beck and Daley 1995). The newly “revealed” hues were not, in short, what they preferred to associate with one of the crowning works of the Renaissance. Sociologists are beginning to think more systematically about how aesthetic knowledge is codified, imbued with authority, and negotiated. Continuing this line of enquiry is essential for claiming aesthetic knowledge as a patterned and observable facet of social life.

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Using colour in my art is a relatively new experience for me. Most of what I drew before this course was in black and white with an emphasis on realistic drawings. I often wondered why I was more confident using monochrome and feared using colour especially as I have always admired artists who used bold, bright colours in their art!

Other than just being aesthetically pleasing to the eye, colours are highly linked with energy and emotion. From ‘feeling blue’ to ‘seeing red’ and  ‘being green with envy’, some of the everyday idioms we use to express our emotions, colours have a daily impact on us. We feel happy and positive on a bright sunny day and low or drained when it’s dark and gloomy. We live in a colourful world, both in a literal and metaphorical sense and many of our everyday choices involve colour to a certain extent, from the clothes that we wear to the food that we eat.

Throughout history artists have been mixing and making their own colours, sometimes deriving pigments from unusual or even hazardous sources. Certain colour palettes have been favoured by each of the art movements; the Fauves were keen on outrageous, bold colours and believed that colours had a spiritual quality and because they were directly linked to emotions they wanted to use them at their highest possible pitch.

Artists have all along been choosing colours that they feel connected to, using them to express their emotions and hoping that their choices resonate with an audience.

Vincent Van Gogh 

When Van Gogh met the Impressionists he abandoned his use of dark tones in favour of pure primary and secondary colours and over time, his superb colour sense along with his decisive brushstrokes became his signature style that has stood the test of time.

His painting of Noon (after Millet) is one of my favourite ones; although he used a limited palette, I really love his bold, almost explosive use of the warm yellows and oranges against the deep blues. This painting makes me feel happy and serene at that same time.

There is a harmony and balance between the warm and cold colours and in my opinion, there is a serenity and mellowness that emanates from this painting. Firstly, because of the scenery and the fact that the two people are resting. Secondly, because of the colour hues that Van Gogh chose to create this tranquil feeling which would not have been achieved were he to use the exact same colours in their pure form. His clever use of mark making is suggestive of movement amongst the stillness and the passing of time while the two people are taking a nap.

Noon (after Millet) 1890

In  one of his letters to his brother Theo, while he writes to him about his painting of the Night Café, he describes his choice of colours with obsessive detail, referring to their intensity, hue and saturation as well as symbolism.

“I’ve tried to express the terrible passions of humanity with red and green. The room is blood red and dull yellow, with a green billiard table in the middle; there are four lemon yellow lamps casting an orange and green glow. Everywhere there’s a struggle and a clash between the very different greens and reds-in the small figures of the sleeping good-for-nothings, in the sad and empty room in violet and blue….”

It is evident that colour meant a lot to Van Gogh because he perceived it as a form of a visual language.

When his mental state became fragile towards the end of his life Van Gogh carried on painting his self-portraits in colour, many of them engulfed by blue as opposed to black or any other dark and ‘heavy’ colours. Blue is one of the so called ‘cold’ colours and

The intensity of his palette, however, had changed and reflected a change in his emotional state.

From a symbolic point of view, it is thought that the colour blue has religious significance and symbolises the divine and spiritual; so the blue in his portraits, whether used consciously or subconsciously, has psychological connotations and could be seen as his quest for God.

I have often looked at Van Gogh’s works while looking for inspiration. I find his work visually exciting and stimulating and will continue to do so in the future.

Gustav Klimt

I love Klimt’s work and the way he explores colour, shapes and patterns. The small geometrical shapes dotted around the painting form pools of patterns and remind me mosaics. The body appears to be supported and enveloped in a multi-coloured quilt. It’s as if Klimt couldn’t bear to leave any of the colours out of his paintings!

The gold within his portraits acts as a mirror and reflects light giving his portraits an opulent feel and makes me think as though I am looking at one of the most expensive paintings in the world! The golden hues also remind me of Greek Orthodox Iconography which I grew up with.

I love the richness of the warm golds, browns and reds and how he gathers and contains those small coloured shapes within bigger, flowing, almost moving shapes that seem to overlap with one another. Every here and there one can notice a few ‘cold’  colour accents’ of greens and blues that help create a dynamic equilibrium!

Adele Bloch-Bauer, 1907

Elizabeth Peyton

I wanted to revisit and re-examine the work of Elizabeth Peyton as her portraits are focused mainly on the face and see how she uses colour. I also like her free and expressive brushwork/pencilwork along with her choice of colour to portray her subjects; when I look at her work I get the feeling of  a spontaneous and intuitive way of working.

Portraits of Chloe, by Elizabeth Peyton.

Another reason I like Peyton’s work is because she does not seem pre-occupied with detailing the background and uses colour as pattern to create a sense of space. Similarly, I like to focus my energy and attention on the people’s facial features and expressions, leaving the background white or abstracting it.

On some of her portraits she seems to focus her efforts on injecting most of the colour on the model’s clothes and surrounding environment, leaving their face almost blank as an indication of them either lacking emotion or being bathed in light from within! This method provides harmony and balance within an artwork as there are not too many things to overstimulate the brain!

Some of her sitter’s features like the eyes or lips maybe accentuated with colour; she most probably wants to bring to our attention that the eyes are the windows of the soul and the lips, (often painted bright red on both male and female),  not only are they used for talking but are also a symbol of sexuality.

She uses colour both in a what I call ‘concentrated’, almost pure form that has been deposited quickly onto her support with only small hint of tonal variations. In sharp contrast to the large areas of colour she uses raw, emotive lines that are minimally blended and create the feeling of dynamism and movement as well as texture. Some of her portraits are bathed in rich, opulent colours, bursting with warmth whereas others have a cold and distant feel to them. Two examples are the portraits of Chloe which I find very warm and appealing and the portrait of Daniel that feels cold and eerie.

Daniel, by Elizabeth Peyton.

The emotions of her sitters are hard to translate because although their expressions are quite sombre and make me feel as though they maybe sad or contemplative, her use of bright colours would suggest the opposite. Although in her painting of Daniel the watercolour drips resemble tears and her muted palette is suggestive of his dampened spirits and sadness. It may be the case that Peyton wants to juxtapose her sitters’ perceived fame and glamour with the quietness and sadness of their inner worlds that are in fact the opposite, (none of her sitters are smiling).

    All Too Human Exhibition , visit at the Tate Britain Gallery, 14.05.1

During my late visit to Tate Britain I had the opportunity to see some of Francis Bacon’s artwork.

His paintings really stood out from the crowd for their unusual, abstract representation of the human form, minimalistic compositions and dull colours. At first glance his portraits seemed frightening, inspired by violence and nightmares.

Although black dominated some of his work, he did use subtle colours to suggest human flesh and the surrounding environment. His figures and portraits resemble apparitions,  raising questions as to whether Bacon was preoccupied with death or dealt with mental issues.

Sometimes a bright colour such as the yellow in the image on the left, creates a focal point and draws our attention towards the middle of the painting.

When I first looked at the yellow ring in this painting I thought of a halo or maybe a portal to another world. Although in most cultures the colour yellow symbolises brightness and happiness, in others it is synonymous with death. So it is possible that the three figures are encountering a transfiguration of some sort!

The juxtaposition of the yellow and grey in this painting create a simultaneous contrast and exploit our psychological capacity of colour to arouse intense emotions.

There is no doubt that Bacon’s dark, earthy, moody tones in combination with his aggressive mark making conveyed messages of anger, angst and emotional trauma to the viewer.

We all have a personal relationship with colours and there is unequivocal evidence that colours have emotional and psychological effects on all of us.

I would like to finish with one of Kandinsky’s quotes that sums it all up: “Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the harmonies, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul”.

  References:

Drawing now, eight propositions, Hoptman, Laura J. 2009. New York: Museum of Modern Art.

https://colormatters.com/color-and-design/basic-color-theory accessed 17.05.18

http://artyfactory.com/art_appreciation/art_movements/fauvism.html accessed17.05.18

http://www.theartstory.org/movement-fauvism.html accessed 17.05.18

http://www.psyartjournal.com/article/show/bekker-color_and_emotion_a_psychophysical_analy accessed 17.05.18

http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/18/533.html accessed 17.05.18

http://www.webexhibits.org/pigments/intro/history.html accessed 17.05.18

http://www.webexhibits.org/colorart/contrast.html accessed 17.05.18

Assignment 5- Research: Colour and emotion. Using colour in my art is a relatively new experience for me. Most of what I drew before this course was in black and white with an emphasis on realistic drawings.

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Eva

Eva woke up once again, to the crooked wooden ceiling of the house her family has lived in since forever. She got up from her metal-framed bed whose paint has chipped off almost entirely. She felt her back ache as she lifted herself from the thin, mushed mattress she laid on. She stretched, hoping to get rid of the pain. She has been living like this her entire life. It was a dreadful, uncomfortable life brought about by her parents’ decision to divorce, leaving her in the care of her mother, who had no stable job, and merely relied on her husband, Eva, and her siblings’ step father.

Eva went to the kitchen where she found her older sister, Ilse, already up, heating some water and cooking eggs for herself and her 2 siblings. Their mother was still in the bedroom, sleeping with her husband who was their stepfather. She helped prepare breakfast by setting the table. Meanwhile, the youngest among all of them busied herself by sweeping the leaves that fell in front of their house.

While she was preparing, Eva dropped a glass which then awakened their stepfather. He exited their bedroom door, and the three siblings took note of the sound of his footsteps. Eva rushed to pick up the shards of glass left on the floor. “Was zur Hölle war das! Who is the clumsy b***h that broke a f*****g glass in the f*****g morning?” he shouted. He arrived at the kitchen and found the 17-year-old Eva picking up glass. And just like his response to everything that did not conform to what he wanted, he resorted to violence.

The teenager swore that the moment she graduated from high school, she’d find a job far away from her family and earn enough to take her younger sibling with her.

So, two months after graduation, Eva became a step closer to her dream as she landed a job at a Nazi studio owned by Heinrich Hoffman, but not far from where her family lived. Eva was always into photography, so landing this job was a big deal for her. It was a prestigious job, getting to work for such a renowned photographer. Hoffman was known to have rich and famous clients. Her task at the studio was simple; she was assigned as Hoffman’s assistant, but at the same time his apprentice. She worked hard, and got paid good money for the job. And because Eva was a fairly beautiful blonde with a great figure as well, she was also called by Hoffman to model sometimes.

One day at work, Eva was by one of the tables fixing the equipments when a well-groomed older man walked in the studio. He wore a well-fitted suit that just screamed politics, and his hair was cut in a very clean, particular way. His defining facial feature was his moustache, which was trimmed right at the ends of his nostrils. His shoes were shiny, and his pants ended right below his ankles. He spoke to Hoffman, and as he did, his deep, strong voice caught the attention of Eva. She knew that this unfamiliar man was going to be a major client, so she quickly fixed herself.

Heinrich, out of the blue, called Eva and asked her to pose for the camera. He took shots of Eva as the unusual man watched the young lady pose. After a few more shots, Heinrich invited the man to his office where they discussed a deal. Eva could hear their mumbles and a bit of laughter as she stayed near the door. Half an hour after, the two men walked out of the office and happily shook each other’s hands. The unusual man glanced a few times at Eva as he and Heinrich lightly conversed.

Later that evening, she asked Hoffman who the man was, and what had happened in his office. “Dieser mann, which I’m surprised you’re not familiar with, is herr Adolf Hitler, our newest client. What happened inside my office is none of your business anymore, Eva, but know that he is paying us a good amount, and it should be for a good reason,” Heinrich told her as she nodded.

An hour had passed when Heinrich left the studio, leaving the responsibility of locking the studio to Eva’s hands, as he usually did. Later on, Eva snooped around Hoffman’s office and looked for papers that could have been related to what Hoffman and Hitler discussed. In one of his locked drawers, of which Eva found the key in one of the coats left behind, was a contract signed by both parties that discussed the agreement. Heinrich was to be Hitler’s personal photographer, being paid a lot of money. This interested Eva a lot. The next lines of the contract discussed the guidelines, of which one caught Eva’s attention. She was to be the only third party to provide any assistance to Hoffman whenever he was to provide Hitler with any form of service, as per Hitler’s request. Eva was surprised. It puzzled her immensely as to why the unusual man would entrust such a responsibility to her.

After a few days had passed, Mr. Hitler gave the studio another visit. Heinrich accommodated him, and brought him to the shooting area. Adolf posed in front of the camera with various hand gestures. One, raising his fist in the air, and another, pointing to what seemed like an imaginary audience. They were unusual, but they portrayed strong character.

Heinrich called on Eva to help with the equipment. She adjusted the lights so it hit Adolf’s face perfectly. She stayed on the side and watched them, but more particularly, Adolf. She observed his every move, the way his body changed poses, the way each strike of pose was so strong and revealed his true identity. At one point, Heinrich asked Eva to take the portraits in order to train her. She took some photos, but glanced away from the camera every now and then to look at the real picture.

“Okay, danke, Eva. Danke, Heinrich. That’s enough for today. Would you mind showing me the photos, Heinrich?”

“Eva, du gehst das machen. You can have Eva to do that, would you mind?” Hoffman told him.

“Mitnichten. Shall we?” Adolf said inviting the young lady to sit down with him.

“Bitte warte eine Weile. I have to develop these photographs first,” Eva replied.

Eva went into the dark room, and started the process of developing photos. As she reached the final step, she looked at the photographs and analyzed each one. She then lets them dry before leaving the room. She sat with Adolf for the meanwhile as she waited for the photographs to fully dry.

They sparked up a small conversation where she learned that Adolf is a politician, known for being a member of the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, the German Worker’s Party for many years. Eva seemed to be interested in this rich, older man as more than just his photographer’s assistant. She found this man to be highly unusual, gaining more interest in him. He talked and acted in a very particular way. He liked things done fast, and in the most orderly manner. She went back into the dark room to retrieve the photographs and showed them to Adolf.

She asked him, “Herr, ist es in Ordnung zu fragen? What are these pictures for?”

“Das Ansehen. Reputation, dear Eva. These are my practice pictures so I know which poses I can use when I deliver my speeches. Have you ever watched one of my speeches?”

“No, Herr,” she replied. He proceeded to perform an excerpt from one of his speeches, exercising some of the poses in the picture.

“Wie schade, dann. I shall inform you of my next speech, so that you may be able to have the opportunity to watch at least one. I believe I am destined for something great, and the speeches I create are a pathway for that.”

She liked this man, definitely. There was something about his aura, or maybe it was his stature that Eva found extremely attractive.

The next few visits of Adolf to the Hoffman Studio was a whirlwind of Eva being all over the place, and trying all means to catch Adolf’s attention. She goes into the bathroom minutes before Adolf arrives and stuffs her bra with tissue paper in an attempt to seduce the man. She sparked up conversations every time she’d get the chance to. She loved getting to know him, and with each time they conversed, Eva became more interested. Adolf was somewhat smitten with her too. He’d glance at her from time to time, and one can tell that he was definitely looking at her body, and he was definitely attracted to her as well. However, how could a renowned 40-year-old politician take the fresh high school graduate teenager seriously? He thought nothing more of their relationship than a simple flirtation in Eva’s workspace.

One day, Adolf’s beloved half-niece, Geli, commits suicide. Geli had been living with Adolf for numerous years, and had a very complicated relationship with each other. It was sexual, but the romantic aspect of their relationship was unclear to everyone. Nevertheless, it was evident that they loved each other dearly. He even took Geli to Hoffman’s studio on numerous occasions. One can only imagine how distraught Adolf felt upon learning that the 23-year-old decided to steal his gun and shoot herself in the chest in Hitler’s bedroom. The agony he felt upon discovering her corpse was indescribable.

This brought total anguish upon Hitler, and having Eva around helped him cope with the hurt he felt a lot. Eva was open to comfort Adolf, and he confided in her. He finally began to see more of the teenager. Not long after, they started dating.

However, Adolf made it clear to Eva that the public should not be able to know about their relationship. He wanted to maintain his strong image. He believed that if people found out he was in a relationship, the people would see him as weak, and that love might get in the way of his profession. It was important that he was seen as a figure of strength and power, especially now that Germany was destroyed when the American Stock Exchange has failed, causing America to call in all its foreign loans. The unemployment rate was growing higher and higher, and the government was desperate for an immediate solution.

Because of this, Adolf became busier, working his way up in the German Worker’s Party, which was now known as the Nazi Party. However, he did not fully neglect Eva. In fact, she came along as Adolf went from place to place. She stayed beside Heinrich, as another personal photographer of Adolf, keeping the secrecy of their relationship.

A few years after, the Nazi party grew and became the largest party. The president of Germany deemed that the Nazi party was becoming uncontrollably huge, so he devised a plan with the Chancellor of Germany, Franz von Papen. They wanted to get the Nazis on their side so they offered Adolf the position of Vice Chancellor. However, Adolf refused and demanded them to make him Chancellor instead, which they agreed to.

While Adolf was working to gain more power in the government offices, Eva stayed alone in the bedroom of the small apartment that she had just began sharing with her younger sister. She’d come home to spend the rest of her day without him. She craved his love. They never got to spend as much time as they did before at the studio. More so, whenever they’d be around each other, she was nothing more than his photographer. It killed her inside that she’d be right in front of him, taking his pictures, but she was not even allowed to talk to the one whom she loved dearly. Eva, just like any other woman who’d be treated the same way, fell into depression. She became desperate for him.

She sat at the end of her bed. She stared at her reflection from the mirror of her vanity. She stared as she thought to herself, was she not enough anymore? Has she grown out of her beauty at age 21? Was she not worth coming home to anymore? What made him unexcited for her? What was she lacking?

She drowned in these thoughts as her right hand grabbed the gun that she stole from Adolf’s collection. “I just wanted him,” she whispered as the uncontrollable force of her finger pulled on the trigger of the gun that was aimed at her neck. She was immediately found by her sister and rushed to the hospital. It was there when her sister found out that she had missed the artery, and therefore, survived. She wept for her sister’s life, and asked her upon waking up why she’d committed such an act.

“Liebe. All I ever wanted was his love, and he has denied me of it,” she told her sister, pertaining to her lover, Adolf.

Later on, the negligent and ever so busy chancellor of Germany received a call, telling him that Eva had attempted suicide as an appeal to get Adolf to show him the love they once had. Of course, he tried his best to keep her happy – providing very well for the young girl so that, at least materially, she was well off. Of course, this wasn’t enough for her, but she lived with it for the meantime, as long as she could take it.

A year later Hitler negotiated that they give him temporary emergency powers for four years. During the negotiation, he tasked his military supporters to threaten them with war, should they refuse. His strategy worked, giving him absolute power over Germany. This was what he had always wanted, but not for Eva.

Of course Eva was happy for him, she was as supportive as any loving partner would be. However, during his rise to power, he slowly lost even more time for his lover, eventually depriving Eva more of the attention she always wanted from him. As a result, she poisoned herself in another desperate attempt to catch his attention.

Even if Adolf treated her poorly around others, and that his love for her was intermittent, there was love. And what came with that love was the feeling that Adolf did not want to lose her. After her second attempt, Adolf could not help it anymore. He was devastated and never more determined to ensure that Eva stays alive. He could never handle another suicide death by someone close to him after Geli. When he visited Eva in the hospital, he swore to her that he would never let this happen again. He offered for her to live with him at the Berghof, so he’d always come home to her at the end of the day. To stay even closer to her, he hired Eva as his personal secretary.

Everything was going well for the couple behind closed doors, but once they opened, and guests arrived, it was a different story. To keep the secrecy, he treated Eva very poorly. In the beginning, Eva was not allowed to exit her room everytime there would be guests over. But after a while, he finally let her join, which might not have been better after all. He’d talk to her in front of his friends, but in a way that was very degrading. It was as if she was just a mistress, another one of his toys. She bore it all, because she firmly believed that he was only doing this to protect her. No woman would have allowed such treatment, and Eva should be considered a martyr for that. A martyr.. for the wrong reasons, for the wrong person.

It was under Adolf’s administration that World War II began, it was then when millions of innocent Jews were murdered. Eva, just like the other Nazis, adapted to how he ran the country. It was fear and the desire for power that had taken over most of the other Nazis and Germans, but for Eva, perhaps it could have been something else. Perhaps it was love, or maybe something more than that. She was happy seeing him happy, and that was all she ever wanted. She worshipped him, allowing her life to revolve around one man.

One can only wonder what it must feel like to have a murderer come home to your house everyday and sleep in the same bed with him. Eva had a strong personality. She knew what she wanted, and she got it all. But it wasn’t going to last long. The man she hopelessly devoted her life to, had sins to pay. The Nazis were losing the war, their time for freedom was counted by the days, and soon, hours. Adolf felt great pain, and Eva, fear.

Adolf was to travel in the Fuhrerbunker to Berlin, where he was about to meet his self-inflicted death. As he was saying his farewell to his ever-loyal lover, she asked only two things from him. “Adolf, meine Liebe, mein Leben, I don’t know how long we have until imprisonment, but I want to swear my life to you, formally, for better or for worse,” she said.

“Eva, Ist das, was ich denke, es ist? Are you asking me to get married?”

“Meine Liebe, we don’t even know if they’re going to kill you once they get their hands on you, or me. For once in my life, before anything happens, let me be called Eva Hitler, so that all those who know me may remember that I eternally belong to you. Because of our time constraint, you should also let me travel with you, and we can proceed with the ceremony in the Fuhrerbunker.”

Within the next few hours, the two travel to the Fuhrerbunker, where they are married by a local official. “I, Adolf Hitler take Eva Braun to be my wife. To have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer, and I promise my love to you. With this ring I thee wed,” he proclaims as he gives her a simple ring that once belonged to his mother.

“I, Eva Braun take Adolf Hitler to be my wife. To have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer, and I promise my love to you. With this ring I thee wed,” she said as she gave him a ring that once belonged to his father. In that very moment was the epitome of her happiness. At least now she could say, she was his forever.

A marriage contract is presented to them, and they were both asked to sign it. On Eva’s turn she writes her first name “Eva” followed with a “B,” which she erased with scribbles on the paper and replaced with “Hitler.” Eva Hitler was her new name, the name she’d been dreaming of for years.

But it didn’t end here. An hour went by, and just as Adolf was preparing his last will and testament, she got up to him and told him, “Kann ich dir zuerst etwas sagen? If it matters to you, you’re going to be a father, but I guess not anymore.”

“Eva,” he said with a shocked face. “Eva,” he mumbled once more. “Eva, sag mir die Wahrheit. This is not the time. Why did you not tell me sooner? I would have set another plan for us to live as a family in peace in another country if you did.”

Adolf felt empathy for their unborn child. He has killed millions of Jews but somehow, it was only this one life that mattered to him at that moment.

“Will you live for your child?” she asked.

“But the child will have a miserable life, even if I’m around, because I would be incapable to attend to him,” he replied.

“Having a father who cares for his child, even if not present at all times, is a million times better than a father who neglected his child even before he was born,” she told him with the heaviest heart.

Because of this, Adolf decided that he’d live for his flesh and blood, but little did he know that there was none of that. ‘Twas merely a lie told by his lover, who thought that she could not live without him. Because he would not live for her, she thought that maybe he’d live for their child, at least. Adolf was selective for whom he cared for. It was almost as if he would either not have any regard for your life at all, or he would treasure you dearly, which was the side that Eva and her imaginary child were lucky to be on.

The troops were closing in on the Fuhrerbunker. Adolf decided to open its doors and surrender willingly. Two soldiers grab him, and others remain surrounding him. Another one grabs Eva and all the other accomplices found within the bunker.

Allied officials, even though their utter hatred for the man who killed millions of Jews gave them the urge to kill and even torture the man, decided that it was best for Hitler to be kept away in maximum security, because killing him and torturing him would not have made them any better than him. There were human rights laws they had to abide by. Though he had accomplished violating those for millions of people, the Allied forces could not bear to be judged as immoral, especially when there were other countries to consider.

They locked him up in Ognenny Ostrov, a maximum security prison in the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, Eva, though can be considered an accomplice to his crimes, was set free, for not really having any major participation. However, she was not given permission to visit him, given that it was a maximum security prison on an secluded island after all. She managed to bribe one of the guards stationed at the boarding dock going to Ognenny Ostrov, however, and convinced him to hand Adolf a letter that she wrote as her last farewell to him, given that he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

In the letter, she wrote about how much he meant to her. “You were my first love, Adolf, and my only one, til death do us part,” the letter read. “You will forever remain in my heart and I hope I, in yours. Live without worry, my love, for I will ensure the safety of our child until the day they grant you freedom.”

She took a train back to Germany and went to her small apartment in Munich, where she poured a glass of wine and pondered on her thoughts. It was hopeless for her to ever see her lover again. A life without him was a life not worth living. She took the glass and indulged in the cyanide-induced wine. In less than an hour, she died. She died with the lie fed to her husband that they had an unborn child.

Adolf is left to live a life of imprisonment, where he was bound to submit to all authorities, of which he was not used to. Oh, how the tables have turned. It had only been a month since he was imprisoned, but the environment was one he could never tolerate. He received the letter from Eva, and although he kept her words to heart, his egoistic, prideful nature soon could not bear what he had to go through every day. It was that same nature of his that pushed him down the edge of the 20-foot watchtower that sat right at the edge of the cliff of Ognenny Ostrov.

At last, the two lovers were inseparable somewhere in the cold, bitter afterlife that awaited them. What could be so different though, anyway?

[imogenart99-blog]

Self Into Media Evaluation.

For this project, my theme was Popular Culture in film, more specifically alternative/horror films. I chose to focus on films of the alternative genre rather than multiple genres because horror is my favourite type of film.

 In my project I researched various artists that link to my work. Elizabeth Peyton is an artist who paints portraits of various celebrities and people; such as Bowie. This links to my theme as we both have the same theme of popular culture, but on different subjects. David Mach is a sculptor and installation artist whose style is based on assemblages of mass produced objects which links to my ideas of creating busts.

Lastly I researched Jeff Koons who is an artist who works with popular culture subjects and creates sculptures which links both into my theme and idea.

   I decided to focus on my favourite characters from the films in the genre I was looking at. When doing my research into busts I found that they were extremely popular in Roman times and were made to look like and represent important leaders and figures. I thought it would be interesting if I used this information and generated ideas of busts based on various movie characters.

For my final piece I wanted to create a 3D Frankenstein's monster bust.

 Frankenstein's monster was a creation of Dr.Frankentein; he wasn't of importance, he was in fact a monster. By creating a 3D bust of Frankenstein's monster it gives him importance as well as status, after all he is the first thing you think of when you hear the name Frankenstein and not Dr.Frankenstein who the film is named after. 

 Frankenstein is an extremely iconic film/book in the horror genre (another example is Dracula). So by creating a 3D bust it credits the film/book as well as Frankestein's monster.

 For my actual final piece I firstly tried to papier-mâché a neck and head on a pringle tube to form the monsters base structure. Once I finished sculpting with papier-mâché the shape didn't look correct, (more like an Eastern Man) so I came up with a different method of creating my sculpture. Instead of creating a bust I improvised by creating Frankenstein's monster neck and face which was attached to a wooded plaque. 

I firstly bought a plain plastic mask which I used to help sculpt the face with papier-mâché, to create the square head.

Next, I built a neck gradually by using papier-mâché until it was in proportion to the head. After this dried, the next step was creating the shape of his eyes, nose and lips which I gradually built up using the same technique. After this I painted the finishing touches on, which included skin colour, bolt and scar details as well as the electrocution panels on the forehead and background (including lightning bolts).

 The background on the plaque I painted in a dull grey with yellow lightening strike to represent a storm and the electricity which links to the film and his creation. 

 For his face and neck, the only detail I painted were scars, metal plates (electricity conductor) and bolts as I wanted to keep the overall look minimal but highlight the more obvious and traditional features which make him memorable. I painted the scars in black acrylic to appear bold and stand out and the metal electrocution plates and bolts in a metallic silver.

Over all, I am happy with how my final piece turned out, despite the fact I had to start over. I really like how the sculpture is attached to the wooden plaque and 

I am pleased with how the shape of his head, neck and facial features turned out despite it being difficult. Although I am happy with my sculpture if I had to change anything I would change the colour of his skin and paint. I was originally using acrylic paint for his skin and ran out so had to use poster paint as well, it is a different texture and dried with cracks .Although I’d change the colour of his skin and use just acrylic it does look effective the cracks in his skin as it show his imperfections, he is a creation and a monster. 

Although my original idea was to create a bust I think the sculptor of Frankenstein's head and neck on the plaque turned out extremely well

[frankkmartin25-blog]

Man given face transplant overjoyed at results

He'd been waiting for this day, and when his doctor handed him the mirror, Andy Sandness stared at his image and absorbed the enormity of the moment: He had a new face, one that had belonged to another man.

His father and his brother, joined by several doctors and nurses at Mayo Clinic, watched as he studied his swollen features. He was just starting to heal from one of the rarest surgeries in the world - a face transplant, the first at the medical center.

He had the nose, cheeks, mouth, lips, jaw, chin, even the teeth of his donor. Resting in his hospital bed, he still couldn't speak clearly, but he had something to say.

He scrawled four words in a spiral notebook:

"Far exceeded my expectations," he wrote, handing it to Dr. Samir Mardini, who read the message to the group.

"You don't know how happy that makes us feel," Mardini said, his voice husky with emotion as he looked at the patient-turned-friend he had first met nearly a decade earlier.

The exchange came near the end of an extraordinary medical journey that revolved around two young men. Both were rugged outdoorsmen and both just 21 when, overcome by demons, they decided to kill themselves: One, Sandness, survived but with a face almost destroyed by a gunshot; the other man died.

Their paths wouldn't converge for years, but when they did - in side-by-side operating rooms - one man's tragedy offered hope that the other would have a second chance at a normal life.

It was two days before Christmas in 2006 when Andy Sandness reached a breaking point.

He'd been sad and drinking too much at that time. That night after work while "super, super depressed," he grabbed a rifle from a closet. He stared at it for a while, then put a round in the chamber.

He positioned the barrel beneath his chin, took a deep breath and pulled the trigger.

Instantly, he knew he'd made a terrible mistake. When the police arrived, an officer who was a friend cradled him in his arms as Sandness begged, "Please, please don't let me die! I don't want to die!"

He was rushed from his home in eastern Wyoming, treated at two hospitals, then transferred to Mayo Clinic.

When he woke, his mother was holding his hand. She'd always been a strong woman but that day, her face was a portrait of unfathomable pain. The bullet had obliterated his mouth, so he motioned for a pen and paper.

"I'm sorry," he wrote.

"I love you," she replied. "It's OK." But all Sandness could think about was how he'd hurt his family - and just wonder what was next.

The answer came quickly when he met Mardini, a plastic surgeon whose specialty is facial reconstruction. As a newcomer at Mayo, the doctor was on call Christmas Eve. Over the next few days, he reassured Sandness that he'd fix his face as best he could.

"I just need you to be strong and patient," he said.

It would take time and much surgery. And despite their skills, the doctors couldn't miraculously turn him back into that guy with the orthodontist-perfected smile.

Sandness couldn't bear to see himself, so he covered his hospital room mirror with a towel. He had no nose and no jaw. He'd shot out all but two teeth. His mouth was shattered, his lips almost nonexistent. He'd lost some vision in his left eye. He needed breathing and feeding tubes at first.

Mardini and his team removed dead tissue and shattered bones, then connected facial bones with titanium plates and screws. They reconstructed his upper jaw with bone and muscle from the hip; they transferred bone and skin from a leg to fashion the lower jaw.

They used wires and sutures to bring together his eyelids, which had been spread apart by the powerful blast.

They made progress, even if it didn't always look that way.

After about eight surgeries over 4½ months, Sandness returned home to Newcastle, Wyoming, a hamlet of 3,200, where friends and family embraced him. He worked at a lodge, in the oil fields and as an electrician's apprentice.

But his world had shrunk. When he ventured to the grocery store, he avoided eye contact with children so he wouldn't scare them.

Occasionally, he heard them ask their mothers why he looked that way.

He sometimes lied when folks asked what had happened. "I would tell them it was a hunting accident," he says. "I felt like they didn't need to know."

He had almost no social life; on a rare night out to shoot pool, a guy taunted him about his appearance. He retreated to the hills, where he could hunt elk and fish walleye, unseen.

"Those were real tough times for him,' says his father, Reed. "He was insecure. Who wouldn't be?"

Sandness learned to adapt. His mouth was about an inch wide - too small for a spoon - so he tore food into bits, then sucked on them until he could swallow the pieces. He wore a prosthetic nose but it constantly fell off outdoors; he carried glue to reattach it. It discolored often, so he had to paint it to match his skin.

"You never fully accept it," he says. "You eventually say, 'OK, is there something else we can do?'"

There was, but the prospect of 15 more surgeries Mardini had mapped out scared him. He didn't want more skin grafts, more scars or dental implants. Even then, he'd still look deformed.

Over the next five years, Sandness made yearly visits to Mayo. Then in spring of 2012, he received a life-changing call.

Mardini told him it looked like Mayo was going to launch a face transplant program and Sandness might be an ideal patient. The doctor had already begun traveling to France, Boston and Cleveland to meet doctors who'd done face transplants.

Mardini tried to temper his patient's enthusiasm. "Think very hard about this," he said. Only about two dozen transplants have been done around the world, and he wanted Sandness to understand the risks and the aftermath: a lifelong regimen of anti-rejection drugs. But Sandness could hardly contain himself. "How long until I can do this?" he asked.

He followed Mardini's advice to research the surgery. It was far more complicated than he'd imagined, but he was undeterred.

"When you look like I looked and you function like I functioned, every little bit of hope that you have, you just jump on it," he says, "and this was the surgery that was going to take me back to normal."

Three more years passed as Sandness waited.

By then, Mayo Clinic had completed a long internal review to get the face transplant program approved. Sandness had to undergo a rigorous psychiatric and social work evaluation to address, among other things, a key question: Should this surgery be performed on someone who'd attempted suicide?

Several factors were in his favor: His resilience and motivation, a strong support network of family and friends, a long-standing rapport with Mardini and a gap of several years since the shooting.

"I don't think there's anybody who doesn't deserve a second chance," Mardini says.

Asked by the doctors what he expected from the transplant, to make sure he had realistic goals, Sandness said he wanted a working nose, the ability to bite, swallow, chew, and to "get good stares as opposed to bad stares."

These incremental steps benefited everyone, says Dr. Hatem Amer, Mayo's medical director of reconstructive transplantation.

"He wasn't rushing us, and we weren't rushing him," he says. "He really understood what he was embarking upon."

Sandness says he was concerned both about the possibility of rejection and potential side effects of anti-rejection drugs, including skin cancer, infection, diabetes and weakening of the bones.

Mardini and his team devoted more than 50 Saturdays over 3½ years to rehearsing the surgery, using sets of cadaver heads to transplant the face of one to the other. They used 3-D imaging and virtual surgery to plot out the bony cuts so the donor's face would fit perfectly on Sandness.

In January 2016, Sandness' name was added to the waiting list of the United Network for Organ Sharing.

Mardini figured it would take up to five years to find the right donor: a man with matching blood and tissue types, roughly the same size as Sandness, within a 10-year age range and a close skin tone.

But just five months later, Mardini got a call: There might be a donor. He phoned Sandness, cautioning it was just a possibility. The next day, Mardini got the final word: The donor's family had said OK.

The decision came from a 19-year-old newlywed mourning the sudden loss of her husband.

In early June, Calen "Rudy" Ross fatally shot himself in the head. His devastated widow, Lilly, was eight months pregnant.

Despite her grief, she was committed to carrying out her husband's wishes: On his driver's license, Ross, who lived in Fulda, Minnesota, had designated he wanted to be an organ donor. Lilly met with a coordinator from LifeSource, a nonprofit group that works with families in the upper Midwest to facilitate organ and tissue donation.

Since Ross had been healthy and just 21, his heart, lungs, liver and kidneys could be donated. But additional screening determined he could do even more: He was a good match for a man awaiting a face transplant at Mayo Clinic.

In a second conversation, LifeSource broached the idea to Lilly.

"I was skeptical at first," she says. "I didn't want to walk around and all of a sudden see Calen." She was reassured the donor had his own eyes and forehead and would not be recognizable as her husband. After consulting with her husband's best friend, she gave her consent.

A CT scan, other tests and a photo sent to Mardini by LifeSource confirmed the two men were a good match. Mardini said when the doctors studied Ross' photo, "we got chills when we actually saw how close they were in hair color, skin - just the overall look. It could be his cousin."

Late on June 16, Sandness was wheeled into surgery, accompanied by Mardini, who was showing him photos of his two small children. Over the years, the two say they've become as close as brothers.

"There was not a second of doubt that everything was going to go well," Sandness says.

"Everybody went into this totally knowing their role, knowing what to expect," Mardini recalls. "Every step has been thought out 1,000 times."

Mardini had a parting message: "We're looking forward to seeing you with a new face."

In adjoining operating rooms, some 60 surgeons, nurses, anesthesiologists and others had gathered for what would be a 56-hour marathon.

The surgery that started shortly before midnight Friday was over early Monday morning.

It took about 24 hours to procure the donor's face, which involved taking bone, muscle, skin and nerves, and almost the same time to prepare Sandness. His entire face was rebuilt below his eyes, taking an additional 32 hours. The medical team rotated, many taking four-hour breaks through the weekend.

One of the most intricate parts of the surgery was identifying facial nerve branches on both men and stimulating them with an electric current to determine their function. That allowed doctors to make the correct transfers, so when Sandness thinks about smiling or closing his eyes, for example, those movements actually happen.

After the surgery ended, Mardini proclaimed it "a miracle."

Sandness, who was sedated for several days, wasn't allowed to see himself immediately. His room mirror and cell phone were removed. His father, Reed, served as his eyes.

"I said, 'Andy, I've never lied to you. I'm telling you you're going to be happy with what you see,'" he recalls. "He was quizzing me and the nurses all the time."

Three weeks later, when he finally did see his face - a scene captured on a Mayo video - his father says it "was just a real tearful, hard-to-hold-back time ... beyond our wildest dreams."

Sandness was overwhelmed. "Once you lose something that you've had forever, you know what it's like not to have it," he says. "And once you get a second chance to have it back, you never forget it." Just having a nose and mouth are blessings, he says. "The looks are a bonus."

Months earlier, both he and Lilly Ross had expressed interest in learning about each other. She particularly wanted him to know about her husband, an adventurous, spontaneous guy.

Last fall, she wrote to Sandness and the five others who received her husband's organs. She described Ross, her high school sweetheart, as a "giving person" who loved hunting, trapping and being with his dog, Grit. "I am filled with great joy knowing that he was able to give a little of himself to ensure a better quality of life for someone else," she wrote.

As for the face transplant, she thought of her baby son when she agreed to it. "The reason that I decided to ... go through with it was so that I can later down the road show Leonard what his dad had done to help somebody," she said in a video produced by LifeSource.

Lilly was given photos of Sandness before and after the transplant. That's when she learned of uncanny similarities between the two men - not just their passion for the outdoors, but the way they stood in their hunting photos. "It was amazing how good he looked and how well he's doing,'" she says of Sandness. "I'm excited for him that he's getting his life back."

She also noticed one small detail - a small bare patch in the middle of his bearded chin, just as on her husband's face.

Both she and Sandness hope to meet one day. For now, he wrote her a letter of appreciation. Referring to her husband's favorite things, he said: "He's still going to continue to love hunting and fishing and dogs - through me."

Andy Sandness can pinpoint the day he looked normal.

About three months after the transplant, he was in an elevator when a little boy glanced at him, then turned to his mother without appearing scared or saying anything. "I knew then," he says, "that the surgery was a success."

Last December, he had follow-up surgery to tighten skin on his face and neck and build up bone around his eyes so they're not so recessed.

His facial muscles are growing stronger. He received speech therapy to learn to use his tongue in a new mouth and jaw, and enunciate clearly.

He's thrilled to smell again, breathe normally and be eating foods that were off-limits for a decade: apples, steak and pizza that he shared with his doctors.

His transformation isn't just visible. After the shooting, he says, when he dreamed, he still had his old face. Now, his new face appears in his dreams.

Sandness, now 31, plans to return to Wyoming, work as an electrician and, he hopes, marry and have a family someday.

For now, he savors his anonymity. Recently, he attended a Minnesota Wild game. He bought some popcorn. He watched some hockey. He didn't see any stares or hear any whispers.

He was, as he says, "just another face in the crowd." Just thinking about that makes him smile.