Postcard Image

Postcard Image
As the Victorian era passed into the Edwardian and Roaring Twenties, a market developed for bisque and china bawdy novelties and figurines of women in revealing outfits. Although now most of these figurines seem more coy and cute than ribald and risque, in their time they symbolized the casting off of the perceived restraints of the Victorian era.

These little lovelies included bathing beauties, who came clad in swimsuits of real lace or in stylish painted beach wear, as well as mermaids, harem ladies, and nudies, who were meant to wear nothing more than an engaging smile. Also produced were flippers, innocent appearing figurines who reveal a bawdy secret when flipped over, and squirters, figurines that were meant to squirt water out of an appropriate orifice.

Most were manufactured in Germany from the late 1800s through the 1930s, often showing remarkable artistry and imagination, with Japan entering the market during World War I.

Thursday, January 24, 2019

Feed the Birds

Come feed the little birds, show them you care
And you'll be glad if you do
Their young ones are hungry
Their nests are so bare
All it takes is tuppence from you

"Mary Poppins" (1964), Richard and Robert Sherman


February is National Bird Feeding Month,  Declared by congressional proclamation on February 23, 1994, it urges individuals to provide food, water, and shelter to help wild birds survive, especially during the harsh winter months.  As an amateur birder, I have multiple feeding and water stations around my home, and enjoy watching the wide variety of birds often literally flocking around my house.  As the congressional proclamation declares, "backyard bird feeding is an entertaining, educational, and inexpensive pastime enjoyed by children and adults."  If you want to feed our feathered friends as well, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology has helpful hints regarding the types of feeders and feed.  Plus, this wonderful website can help you identify the birds who subsequently will visit your feeders.

This pretty pincushion doll gets into the spirit of things by offering a tasty tidbit to the colorful bird perched on her wrist.  Of excellent bisque, the half doll is 3 inches and is incised on the back of her base "63 B 10/0."  Her long lower lashes are a decorative technique typical of the German maker William Goebel and she wears her original mohair wig.




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Thursday, January 10, 2019

Making Scents


These two scent-sational perfume atomizers each feature a beautiful belle embracing an oversized perfume bottle.


This nude nymph is by the Czechoslovakian Royal Dux Porcelain.  Seven inches tall, she has a replaced bulb.  The old bulbs and hoses were made of rubber that hardened or warped as it aged and were often covered with a silk net that similarly decayed over the decades.


Underneath she carried the applied pink triangle unique to Dux and the incised numbers "3009" and "7."  After 1918, pieces were also marked "Made In Czechoslovakia."


This flapper with her flacon was produced by the French company Ereblè., which specialized in perfume atomizers.  It is 6.75 inches tall and retains its original hardware stamped "Made in France.


Underneath it is marked not only "Ereblè Limoges" and "France," but also with the intertwined "C" and "S" of Charles Serpaut, who produced perfume bottles, lamps, and other decorative porcelain items in the Limoges region beginning in the 1920s  


A close up showing her beautifully painted and stylized face.






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