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dreamingcostsmoney · 5 years

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The Woman Dies | Aoko Matsuda | Granta Magazine

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Following up to this post, here’s a fantastic look at Victorian “fancy dress balls”–they were all the rage at the time, but really picked up in the later half of the century where the focus was more on self-expression than hiding oneself, as was the case at 18th-century masquerades (Phantom hearkens back to this earlier tradition, but the idea of a masquerade hiding one’s true identity also works perfectly for its theatrical setting).

Here are some wackier costumes from fancy dress balls. I’m in love with this one:

And look! A bee!

Here’s a fashion plate with some costume ideas from across the centuries (and of course, we wouldn’t be in the Victorian era if there weren’t a bit of tone-deaf cultural appropriation with the Native American costume.):

It was actually common for women to wear shorter skirts at these balls so they could show off their fabulous boots (as you see above, and as is the case with Christine’s stage version of the Star Princess dress):

Depending on your host, masks of all kinds were welcome, so you were free to be as unsettlingly disturbing as you wanted while you lounged by the punch bowl and made rabbit eyes at the eligible young heiress whose hand in marriage comes with fifty thousand pounds a year and a lifetime of resentment because women’s rights didn’t exist yet:

Suppose you can’t make it to the most fashionable balls London or Paris this season. If it’s 1883 and you are Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt and happen to have $6 million of disposable income at your fingertips, why not throw your own fancy dress ball for New York City’s elite (and spend millions on champagne alone)? And why don’t you one-up every single one of your guests by dressing as that most wondrous of new inventions, Edison’s electric light? I defy the Rockefellers to steal your spotlight when the spotlight in question could very easily electrocute them.

Like flowers? Of course you do. Like spring? Oh, my God, do you ever. Like pretending you’re but a mere shepherdess, giggling and flouncing away from the advances of the blacksmith’s apprentice? GOOD LORD, YES. Like the 18th century? HELL YES, OH MAN, GIMME THAT ROCOCO SPRING FLOWER EXPLOSION:

BUT WAIT! You’re not gonna let that Rococo Spring Flower Explosion HARLOT flounce away with your suitor, are you? HELL NO, YOU ARE NOT. Which is why you are prepared to send her running dressed as a GORGEOUS FREAKING BUTTERFLY:

But where would a butterfly be without a lovely flower upon which to perch? Enter your secret lesbian lover, the Rose:

Or, if you’re uncomfortable with NOT being the center of attention every waking moment, you could just pull the equivalent of one-upping the bride at a wedding by wearing white and come dressed as the DAMN SUN:

But maybe you’re more of the goth persuasion. Might I suggest a tasteful sorceress?

A dainty Batman ensemble to match your wife’s delicate moth angel gown?

Vampire mistress of the night, perhaps?

Actually, bat motifs were an extremely popular costume option, not just in the 19th century, but also at 18th century balls:

But if it’s 1880 and you want to carry on grandma’s bat tradition, this might be a more modern take on a pocket-sized blood-sucking demon:

Or this:

You are so thrilled to attend the costume ball like the goth nightmare you are, you can hardly contain your enthusiasm:

Here is a tastefully acceptable take on Satan. Might I sample your punch, Mrs. Higgenbottom, before I make away with your soul?

“Oh, Ella!”

“Yes, Constance?”

“Oh, I do so love your seagull gown.”

“Oh, why thank you, my dear friend!”

“But I’ve not the slightest idea what I shall wear to the ball!”

“Why, Constance, it is a simple matter of identifying something near and dear to your heart and then adapting it into a suitable costume. I, for example, find solace in the sea, particularly in the birds of the sea, and most particularly when they nose-dive into and defecate upon the boat, shrieking like banshees in heat. Hence, the seagulls adorning my gown. What do you like the very most, Constance?” “MOTHER-EFFING LOBSTERS.”

Or, maybe you’re just a shameless ho and don’t give a brass farthing about showing your ankles, your calves, your thighs, or your hoo-ha at the Embassy Ball, in which case, blaze it:

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dreamingcostsmoney · 5 years

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Alia Shawkat photographed by Amber Mahoney

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dreamingcostsmoney · 5 years

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If there’s anything worth living for, it’s kittens trying to imitate their moms.

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dreamingcostsmoney · 5 years

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If Cthulhu can be summoned by humans who are so far beneath it, why can’t humans be summoned by ants? The answer is they should be.

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dreamingcostsmoney · 5 years

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I now LOVE archery, I find it a very therapeutic sport. I would be taken away for a couple of hours before we started filming to get back into the rhythm so that it was a fluid movement of picking up the bow and then the arrows and just being able to make it look as authentic as possible.

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E Cherry

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Old thing from last year I just never posted on here, the binding of Fenrir

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dreamingcostsmoney · 5 years

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LET US PREY

guess what, it’s time for an all-new exciting episode of Weird Biology! today we’re investigating this lovely flower that I just found. it was just sitting innocently on a tree branch and it’s a lovely shade of pink, so I-

hang on, it just moved.

what the fuck. lemme just…

aaand it just stabbed me in the finger. sorry folks, turns out we aren’t dealing with a flower at all! it’s the frilly, fashionable master of disguise,

AHA! IT WAS ME ALL ALONG! STAB!

the first westerner to describe the Orchid Mantis in 1879 (a journalist from Australia) thought he was seeing a moving, carnivorous flower! obviously he was wrong, as flowers absolutely don’t do that! ha ha! (the point is, it’s an easy mistake to make. especially if you’re a journalist from 1879.)

the Orchid Mantis is a perfect flower mimic, with a dazzlingly sinister sense of fashion.

SO sinister.

the Orchid Mantis is found in the rainforests of Southeast Asia, from Malaysia to Thailand. they are small and delicate, covered with High Femme pastel frills that conceal their deadly mantid forelegs. (mostly. it’s like seeing the outline of a switchblade under a fancy skirt.)

females grow to be about 3 inches long, while males barely reach half that. they range in color from delicate pinks to lacy purples to eggshell white to that obnoxious pale yellow you only see in Easter decorations.

and except for the giant alarming eyeballs, they look exactly like, well. orchids.

THE BETTER TO SEE YOU WITH, MY DEAR.

like all praying mantids, the Orchid Mantis is a carnivore who feasts on the flesh and possibly souls of lesser insects. but with their fantastically flamboyant fashions, how are they supposed to hunt? well, the answer probably won’t surprise you!

because the Orchid Mantis looks so much like a flower, the pollinators come to it. butterflies, bees, moths, you name it. they buzz in, thinking they’ll get a mouthful of nectar and some pollen like good buggy citizens. and what does the Mantis do when these well-meaning helpful friends show up?

why, they prey.

THE BETTER TO STAB YOU WITH, MY DEAR.

also like all praying mantids, the Orchid Mantis worships the silent gods of Slice n’ Dice. when a delicious butterfly or bee bumbles too close, the Mantis promptly stabs the fuck out of it with a lightning-fast strike, and chows down.

in other words, they’re three inches of Death Metal contained under a thin veneer of tea party.

maybe a tea party where the hostess stabs you in the chest.

when they aren’t victimizing kind and helpful insects who only wanted to see a cool flower, the Orchid Mantis goes about the business of continuing the species. since adults only live about 8 months in the wild, this is more of an urgent matter than you would expect.

because Orchid Mantises are pretty rare and not studied often, we’re not actually sure how the deed is done in the wild. (I’M FINE WITH THAT.) if it’s anything like captive breeding programs, most of the dudes just get straight-up eaten. the Orchid Mantis lady is in complete and terrifying control of the situation, and often prefers a snack to the gentle embrace of a lover.

mantids are just kind of like that.

role model?

if the dude mantis is successful in his efforts, the lady mantis will then go off and lay 50-100 eggs clustered on a stem surrounded by a gross protective foam. in 5 to 6 weeks, the baby mantises will emerge and begin eating each other immediately.

(mantises are HARDCORE.)

seriously though, the babies (which look like itty-bitty adults) are red and black when they hatch. they disperse rapidly into the underbrush, at least the ones who don’t get cannibalized by a sibling. (that was real. did you think that wasn’t real?)

in a few weeks, the babies will molt and grow out of their Goth phase, emerging in the true High Femme style of their parents.

WE WILL NEVER SLEEP! ‘CAUSE SLEEP IS FOR THE WEAK!

because Orchid Mantises are so rarely seen, we’re not actually sure how they’re doing in the wild. it is believed that they are under threat from habitat destruction, as many of the rain forests they live in are plowed over. these frilly creatures need protection and support if we want them to still lurk stabbily in the wild.

however, the Orchid Mantis is extensively bred in captivity for the pet trade. it is the most popular kind of Mantis in the pet trade (for very good reasons), and its beauty and stabby nature will likely be around for a long time yet.

whether you like it or not.

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thanks for reading! you can find the rest of the Weird Biology series here.

if you enjoy my work, maybe buy me a coffee or check out my Patreon to see extra content and support Weird Biology.

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IMAGE SOURCES

img1- Discover Magazine img2- Science Friday img3- Wannabe Entomologist img4- featuredcreature img5- Entonation img6- NPR img7- US Mantis img8- Discover magazine

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I’m blowing u a kiss it should arrive in 3-5 business days

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breakfast + dinner

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Generation Pakistan draws inspiration from an enigmatic source of beauty hiding in plain sight; the colour of our very own skin.

- Nai Rang (New Colors), S/S 18

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The Public Ledger, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, June 8, 1919

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dreamingcostsmoney · 6 years

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A herd of sheep passes through a gate, Brenda Station, Goodooga, Australian, 2012 - by Scott Bridle, Australian

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Sometimes I taste blood in my mouth, but it’s never my own,

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Accept that you’ll sometimes be the bad guy in someone else’s story. Grow from it, forgive yourself, and move on.

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Hi! What are your favorite artists and influences? And what are your favorite mythical creatures? :)

hi! and mythology creatures you say

and griffin hippogriff sphinx things. and merfolk (but yall already know that one haha)

OK so I always keep saying there’s too many artists/influences and whatnot but for once I’m going to (try) list all of the main ones -cracks knuckles-

http://seventypercentethanol.tumblr.com (I love her comics/stories/flow-y ness)

http://ateliersento.com/ (gorgeous watercolor comics and art)

https://victorinripert.tumblr.com/ (really playful art and shapes also there’s a giant mola mola banner art what’s not to love)

http://www.shauntan.net/books.html (super dreamlike idk everything is beautiful period; their comic/book The Arrival is one of my top favs honestly)

https://reykat.tumblr.com/ (everything is so strange and mysterious and beautiful)

http://jenwang.net/ (graphic novels and comics; work is gesturey and lovely)

http://www.emcarroll.com/ (I love her use of comic layouts -esp. online- and stories; mostly horror/creepy things)

http://www.mattrockefeller.com/ (every illustration is so chock full of story and moods)

https://www.artstation.com/milkmafia (really unique gorgeous style and way of approaching art in general)

http://penn.pithytwigs.com/ (beautiful comics and colors)

http://lalage.tumblr.com/ (effortless feeling and elegant art)

https://florianaupetit.com/ (really intriguing illustrations and his lighting/colors are killer)

https://www.instagram.com/pixelpchan/ (tasty paintings; really interesting how he translates things into gouache)

http://man-arenas.tumblr.com/ (sketches/style/shapes/comics are magical and natural)

http://joyang.ca/artwork/ (art shapes are reallym precise and lovely)

https://www.instagram.com/jandruff/?hl=en (gorgeous inks and style)

https://www.enrique-fernandez.com/ (comics and shapes/style are amazing; I have his comic L’ile sans sourire and I still can’t believe it’s digital)

http://www.mrcrook.com/ (mainly for his work on the Harrow County comics; and the comic themselves are great)

http://tohdraws.tumblr.com/ ( I love the digital-ness feeling of his work and his comics/stories; there was an old comic called The Dreamwalker Chronicles and that influenced me a ton/stuck with me)

http://yvanduque.tumblr.com/ (everything feels like a fairy tale and a lot of his stuff is from gouache; art shapes)

https://www.artstation.com/veikka (beautiful environments and shapes/colors)

http://tomscholes.tumblr.com/ (I love how his works feels really ornate)

http://tobiaskwan.tumblr.com/ (everything is greaat sketches/paintings are dark moody and gorgeous)

http://www.cliochiang.com/illustration/ (how she draws/sketches people and uses different mediums)

https://www.instagram.com/kei_acedera/?hl=en (really neat concepts/kinda dreamy and soft -honestly makes me think of cotton candy haha)

http://mmcoconut.tumblr.com/ lovely art shapes/characters

https://e.tatsurokiuchi.com/#_=_ (really cool style/flatness of art shapes and use of color/texture)

https://www.boltcityproductions.com/ (what made me want to start making comics was his comic anthology called Flight; found a ton of artists through those comics)

https://twitter.com/amykibuishi?lang=en (one of the first webcomics I ever read online; I think right now she’s working on that same webcomic and it’s getting published next year?)

https://claystorks.tumblr.com/ (soft style and really good comics/stories)

http://www.kukuburi.com/ (the website’s under construction but you can still see pages on google; really loved the style and the story was interesting as well)

https://imagecomics.com/comics/series/four-eyes (comic about dragon fighting rings and a boy who’s raising one? it’s great)

East by Edith Pattou (idk I found this book in junior high and it’s always going to have a soft spot in my heart; basically a retelling of East of the Sun and West of the Moon).

I, Coriander by Sally Gardner and The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale (haha all my books/influences are ones I found in highschool/junior high; basically fairy tale-esque stories)

Fairy Tales by Berlie Doherty and Jane Ray (my mom got me this book when I was a kid and the illustrations def. influenced my style).

Coraline by Neil Gaiman (drawings were really cool and I think that’s where I get the slight creepiness sometimes in my art from)

http://dovecotecrest.com/ (it’s a really old webcomic but I still love it/one of my favorites)

Immortal Rain (Meteor Methuselah) by Kaori Ozaki (my favorite manga, story is beautiful and so is the art)

Ancient Magus Bride by Kore Yamazaki (beautiful art and stories, also a favorite)

Ghibli Films of course haha (Howl’s Moving Castle, Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, and esp. the On Your Mark music video)

annddd I think that’s all of them at least the ones I can name off the top of my head haha

#real great source of artists #inspo

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