I LOVE ELECTRICITY!

Good Day Today by threeminutesthirtyseconds

David Lynch is making dance music. And it's wonderful.

BEAUTIFUL SADNESS

Mrs. Howes in mourning dress (1860s)

Closer Bernard Pierre Wolff / Demetrio Paernio

La Douleur (Sorrow) Emile Friant

La Toussaint (All Saints Day) Emile Friant

Portrait of a Noblewoman Dressed in Mourning Jacobo da Empoli

Youth Mourning Sir George Clausen

Feast of All Souls

William-Adolphe Bouguereau

The First Mourning William-Adolphe Bouguereau

STRANGE MAGIC

I can't quite put my finger on what is so intriguing about these photos by Sarah Charlesworth. I do love magic, so I suppose that might be a good place to start.

The composition of her photos in itself is magical. Her subjects appear to be suspended in mid air. It's almost as if they were captured right before they went "Poof!" and disappeared.

I became acquainted with Sarah's photography and collage work whilst randomly interneting by way of this 1990 interview with her in Bomb magazine.

VICTORIAN PSYCHEDELIA

I have fallen completely in love with these early experimental films from Thomas Edison's Black Maria Studio. The Black Maria is widely known as the first movie studio in history, though its New Jersey location was a far cry from the big lights of Hollywood.

The Serpentine Dance (above) was performed around 1895 by Loie Fuller, who was a former burlesque dancer from Chicago. The projection of colorful lights onto her silk wardrobe was her own technique, but was enhanced in post production at Edison studios. Interesting note: apparently the nitrate-based films were hand colored by the wives of Thomas Edison's own employees.

Below is Annabelle Whitford Moore -- one of the first silent sirens of the time -- and Crissie Sheridan, performing The Butterfly Dance. The fluid movements of these costumes combined with the decadent watercolor-color-like treatment of these films is mesmerizing. Simply beautiful.

Can't help but marvel at the fact that the first recorded films were a bit risque (for the time, at least). Could these surreal films really signal the birth of the dirty movie? Perhaps. Though I read a post that refers to them as "Victorian psychedelia," which seems more fitting. And also a ridiculous category some Pitchfork writer might coin to explain a new genre of artists.

ANESTHETIZED

I want a vacation here.