That's "Portrait of a Lady (formerly incorrectly identified as Christina of Denmark, Dowager-Duchess of Milan and Lorraine [1521–1590])" at the Wikipedia article "Bobbin lace" ("Bobbin lace is a lace textile made by braiding and twisting lengths of thread, which are wound on bobbins to manage them. As the work progresses, the weaving is held in place with pins set in a lace pillow, the placement of the pins usually determined by a pattern or pricking pinned on the pillow. Bobbin lace is also known as pillow lace, because it was worked on a pillow, and bone lace, because early bobbins were made of bone or ivory.")
Anyway, I love the painting — the fabulously homely face and the elaborate detail to the clothing.
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88 comments:
Yes, I do the NYT crossword puzzle each night when it’s published at 10 PM Eastern Time.
You do that to relieve stress, right?
Except of course on weekends when it’s published at 6 PM. But what’s destroyed my sleep patterns is the Spelling Bee puzzle which doesn’t come online until 3 AM. Addictive.
Ummm. pluck your eyebrows?
I do the Wall St. Journal crossword in spates. Today I have all day to kill waiting for the Patriots game at 8, so it's a good day for one.
Ann, knowing some of your commenters, I don't think you want to have them telling you what they do every day while looking at portraits of ladies. ;-)
Tryout the Daily Art app. It's free and the Polish art historians who started it do a good job of selecting the artwork.
Not a bad looking silver fox. She still has her red hair and she is flat chested. But her face shows an intelligent person who is open to talk. So who cares about the rest.
The woman in the portrait is certainly not homely, "fabulously" or otherwise. She is a woman in middle age or later who was probably quite attractive in her youth. She still looks handsome and distinguished, and, as traditionalguy points out, she radiates intelligence.
"Today I have all day to kill waiting for the Patriots game"
Bill to the team, "Alright, listen up. All we gotta do is win 4 more games. That's it. Piece of cake."
"...fabulously homely face..."
Does the inclusion of the adjective negate the rest of the descriptive and make it OK to implying someone is ugly? OR, is the double meaning actually a compliment to her beauty?
Curious minds want to know.
In India, when young men place personal ads looking for an eligible young lady to marry, they often say they are looking for a "homely" girl.
Over there, that means one who wants to stay home and run the household.
Ah, corsets!
Is the 'go to random wikipedia link' still there on the website?
AA "There's something I do every day..."
Look out the window with a fixed expression while preparing to topple a lamp table?
That's always a good attention-getter when Meade is slow with the breakfast service.
"There's something I do every day that if you do it too you'll know why I'm looking at this picture today."
No, I don't add elaborate detail to my clothing to make up for a fabulously homely face.
Sorry, sorry.
You have back problems associated with old age so occasionally grasp the back of a chair and get that constipated look as you figure out how to stretch that slipped disk?
Homeliness is next to Godliness.
"Today I have all day to kill waiting for the Patriots game at 8."
As a Lions fan I have all spring to wait until April for yet another screwed up draft pick. 63 years and counting. Aaargh.
"The moment I wake up
Before I put on my makeup
I say a little prayer for you
While combing my hair, now
And wondering what dress to wear, now
I say a little prayer for you."
I'm touched.
Think about her clothing. All that done by hand.
Intricacy of Clothing.
The Dowager Duchess is a dead ringer for Meryl Streep.
I too think Althouse is being unfair in her description.
The painting looks like an actress. I can't think of her name but she always plays sassy older women. I think she is a Dame. I wish I could think of her name so I could go look at her younger photos.
Sebastian:
Ouch!
My condolences, Temujin.
There's something I do every day that if you do it too you'll know why I'm looking at this picture today.
Dress up all in lace and go in style?
She looks a bit like Agnes Moorehead, and a bit like Tom Steyer.
The face may not be attractive by modern standards (standards do change over time), but the artist put intelligence into her eyes.
@Bill, Republic of Texas - Dame Maggie Smith?
Yes!
It's the eyes.
Intelligent, yes, but I wouldn't let Toto get too near her.
"...fabulously homely face ..."
Ben Franklin, a notorious rake, is reputed to have said about ugly women that "all cats are grey in the dark". I've also heard it said about plain women that "it's all pink in the middle", but I doubt Franklin said that.
Check out if that dress still fits?
Any would have a severe pinched look wearing a corset forcing your waist to be about 17 in in diameter.
That lace looks very nice it is very difficult to paint well
Rush wanted to know why homely and comely weren't pronounced the same.
My 3rd great grandmother was homely. She had a high forehead and very fine and very thin hair. The women in my family have been dealing with her hair for generations. In my direct line of descent I am the first woman to have a lot of hair. I still have the high forehead and baby fine hair.
When I look at her picture I worry that she seems so somber. I have a sampler that she stitched just after her marriage in 1839. She was sixteen. From correspondence I know that my 3rd great grandfather was bereft after she died in 1900.
Ultimately, I don’t think these women are homely. I think we have bee ingrained to find beauty in darkened eyebrows, lashes covered with mascara, and lipstick painted lips.
In those days, she had to wake up extra early to jog to the lake and paint a picture of the sunrise.
Though both are Germanic words the initial vowel we write as "o" was different in the beginning - in one it was "ae", the other "u" or "o". Time does this to languages, philology tells us. Tolkien uses this kind of change all the time in the languages in the Lord of the Rings. He was a philologist by training.
One comes from
From Middle English comly, cumly, cumlich, from Old English cymlīċ, cȳmlīċ (compare Old English cȳme (“fine, exquisite”), from Proto-Germanic *kūmiz (“delicate”)), from Proto-Germanic *kūmalīkaz (“pitiful, dear”). Cognate with Middle Dutch komlick, komelick, Middle High German komelīh, gomelīh.
The other from
Middle English homly, hoomly, hamely (“domestic, familiar, plain”), from Old English *hāmlīc (“of the home, domestic”), from Proto-Germanic *haimalīkaz (“of or characteristic of home”), equivalent to home + -ly. Cognate with Scots hamely (“familiar, personal, private”), West Frisian heimelik, Dutch heimelijk (“secret, secretive, clandestine”), German heimlich (“secret, secretive, clandestine, undercover”), Danish hemmelig (“secret”), Swedish hemlig (“secret, concealed, privy, covert”), Faroese heimligur (“homelike, homey”), Icelandic heimlegur (“homely; worldly”).
No one could dress like that single handed. I bet she had more than one maid.....The clothes are extraordinarily elaborate but they look excruciatingly uncomfortable. Her face reflects self control rather than serenity. Who could be serene or happy in such an outfit? It must have taken patience and self abnegation to spend however many hours to be fit into those contrivances.... I guess you could impress the lesser orders with your wealth and status by dressing so, but there are greater joys to be had in life. Those women with urinary tract infections must have suffered greatly on state occasions.....Nowadays, men emphasize their power and status by dressing down. If you can wear a t-shirt to the boardroom, you know you've arrived. Women still wear elaborate and uncomfortable clothes, at least to red carpet events. Maybe it has something to do with femininity rather than feminism.
Amazing! I just heard Paper Lace’s, The Night Chicago Died on Casey Kasem’s countdown of the Greatest Hits of 1974. Yesterday there was a lace clue on Jeopardy! I never think about lace and here it is three times in two days.
From Ben Franklin's Old Mistresses Apologue (25 June 1745; when the horny Ben was about 40 years old),
"the lower Parts [of the female body] continuing to the last as plump as ever: So that covering all [Parts] above [said lower Parts] with a Basket, and regarding only what is below the Girdle, it is impossible of two Women to know an old from a young one. And as in the dark all Cats are grey, the Pleasure of corporal Enjoyment with an old Woman is at least equal, and frequently superior, every Knack being by Practice capable of Improvement"
Sounds like Ben was a two bagger...
I never think about lace and here it is three times in two days.
Baader-Meinhoff
Showing me what you do everyday just ruined what I do. I hope her wealth made up for things.
Bless her heart.
Her title and appearance remind me of Dowager Countess of Grantham, played by Maggie Smith.
‘Do not make yourself uneasy, my dear cousin, about your
apparel. Lady Catherine is far from requiring that elegance
of dress in us which becomes herself and her daughter. I
would advise you merely to put on whatever of your clothes
is superior to the rest—there is no occasion for anything
more. Lady Catherine will not think the worse of you for
being simply dressed. She likes to have the distinction of
rank preserved.’
P&P
If you want homely, try The Ugly Duchess (or "A Grotesque Old Woman"). This portrait of Margaret, Duchess of Tyrol, was painted by Flemish artist Quinten Massys in 1513. The subject looks like a ridiculous caricature from Mad magazine. But the painting was not satirical. Apparently Margaret was suffering from some sort of rare disease that made her exceptionally ugly.
Look out the window with a fixed expression while preparing to topple a lamp table?
So you hacked our surveillance camera?
Baader-Meinhoff
Now I've seen that twice in one day.
Bless Benjamin Franklin! ;-) And remember one of his arguments in favor of older women was that, 'They are so grateful'.
Not only grateful but having the financial and political clout to get you a nice sincure somewhere. ;-)
a nice sincure
The ones with mercury weren't very nice. My great-uncle, a pharmacist, killed himself experimenting in 1914.
This portrait of Margaret, Duchess of Tyrol, was painted by Flemish artist Quinten Massys in 1513.
How accurate is a portrait that is painted a century and a half after she died?
momma always said "Straighten your back,
...or you'll end up looking like a homely-faced dowager!"
dowager's hump (plural dowager's humps or dowagers' humps)
The hump-like projection seen on the back of older people caused by kyphosis of the spine, consequent to osteoporosis; especially seen in women.
" I can fix that for you" -- Dr. F
Which Was it easier :
to get woman into that dress than knight into armour?
Blogger Ralph L said...
She likes to have the distinction of rank preserved.’
P&P
____&&&&++++
Also Something called sumptuary etc.
Was it still in effect at the time?
Which Was it easier :
to get woman out of that dress than knight out of armour?
Not only did the painting get misattributed but I don't believe that is lace on her dress -- I think it's actually embroidery. Here's an amazing tour de force in needle work Japanese embroidery.
A Centuries of Inbreeding Production...
If you wanna be happy for the rest of your life, never make a pretty woman your wife
A Centuries of Inbreeding Production...
Not nearly as ungainly as the Habsburg Chin
https://gellerreport.com/2020/01/the-new-york-times-seismic-op-ed-in-support-of-president-trumps-assassination-of-terror-leader-qassim-suleimani.html/
derp derp arguing again'st interest isn't good.
Okay then.
Nothing wrong with marrying a pretty woman, Jimmy Soul notwithstanding. So long as she's at least as absorbed with you as she is with herself. I was pretty [some think I still am :-D] and made my husband very happy.
mockturtle said...Bless Benjamin Franklin! ;-) And remember one of his arguments in favor of older women was that, 'They are so grateful'.
--
Emphasis on the plural.
Farmer,
I think you're safe...barring something drastic.
@Guildofcannonballs:
derp derp arguing again'st interest isn't good.
Okay then.
Not sure why Ms. Geller is so shocked(!). The American media establishment is fanatically pro-war and pro-intervention.
@walter:
Farmer,
I think you're safe...barring something drastic.
Haha. Fingers crossed.
22T Dollars of Debt and always always always counting higher higher higher.
But the oldies and my ages who haven't stopped this still wonder why young folks are disorientated? It's because we disorientated them.
To our eternal shame, unless we elect Trump and more-Trump-than-Trump folks.
Cross legs
Fabulously homely gal just missing a MUA
(See Kathy Griffin before/after)
She has dirty nails. They need a good scrubbing.
@walter:
Cross legs
That just gets in the way.
"Not sure why Ms. Geller is so shocked(!). The American media establishment is fanatically pro-war and pro-intervention."
One could argue you using the terms you used makes you more pro ... than them.
I am a full Stephan Cooper believer so I doubt you will gain or learn or teach anything from engaging unread simpletons such as I/me (I mean is is I if ... or me if ...) I don't know.
One could argue you using the terms you used makes you more pro ... than them.
I am a full Stephan Cooper believer so I doubt you will gain or learn or teach anything from engaging unread simpletons such as I/me (I mean is is I if ... or me if ...) I don't know.
I'll get back to you as soon as I've run this message through my Captain Midnight Decoder Ring.
The fancy dress is stock. Artist did a couple dozen. Just adds head and arms later, to save time.
@Farmer
I'll get back to you as soon as I've run this message through my Captain Midnight Decoder Ring.
Inherited, right?
I had thought the whole time betamax3000 took me down.
But it was Cooper the whole time.
She spends a lot of time getting ready, I'd bet.
So is the answer leaning left?
I'll get back to you as soon as I've run this message through my Captain Midnight Decoder Ring.
By the time I received my decoder ring in the mail the show had gone off the air. Wish I'd saved it, though. It was plastic, wasn't it? Kind of disappointing.
I just heard Paper Lace’s, The Night Chicago Died on Casey Kasem’s countdown of the Greatest Hits of 1974. Yesterday there was a lace clue on Jeopardy!
And I just heard the Kinks' "Lacing on a summer afternon." Go figure.
it's too bad they didnt paint in the sash.
Didnt win the beauty contest, but nailed the "Miss Cruel Neutrality" award
If I were looking at that painting as a daily ritual I guess I would be what--repeating mantralike "I'm not THAT ugly I'm not THAT ugly I'm not THAT ugly...." ????
She has dirty nails. They need a good scrubbing.
Was going to quibble with this by proposing a tentative argument that the painting itself hasn't been cleaned properly at any point in the recent past but then zoomed in and continued zooming until I couldn't zoom any further and am pretty sure that those nails are in fact painted as being filthy. And then I thought about 16th c personal hygiene expectations, bathing habits, etc.
Snuff bottle necklace explain dirty fingers!
Daily test for anosmia?
Not just the nails, the whole hand is dirty, but only the right hand, the left hand on the table is clean. She's just been doing something. Fussing with candles? A brazier?
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