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Dickens and His World: Bits and Pieces from From Oxford's Bodleian Library and the Great Dickens Christmas Fair
The Bodleian exhibition aims to recreate Dickens’s world through these ephemeral items, taking visitors on a journey back to his time with themes such as Victorian London and its amusements, the coming of the railways, domestic entertainment and children’s school life. A number of Dickens's works have been recorded by the Libraries, bringing London to life. The Bodleian exhibition illustrates the relationship between the fictional worlds that Charles Dickens created in his novels and the historical reality in which he lived. He depicted the social realities of his time with what Henry James noted as his ‘solidity of specification,’ an extraordinary clarity and particularity. The actualities of life, especially life in London - the setting for almost all his fiction - were of singular importance to him. When we read Dickens we experience Victorian life. more »
Silvia Weidenbach's Jewelry on Display at the Victoria and Albert In an Exhibit Titled Visual Feast
Housed in a suite of galleries in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Collection includes masterpieces from four areas of European and British decorative arts: silver and gold, enamel portrait miniatures, micromosaics and gold boxes. Weidenbach consciously engages with the extravagance of these objects: her box is encrusted with the same abundance of diamonds and mother-of-pearl as their historic counterparts, posing questions of how this aesthetic functions today. more »
The Making of Masterpiece Theater's The Miniaturist and Petronella Oortman’s Dolls' House in Amsterdam's Rijksmusum
Author Jesse Burton’s inspiration for The Miniaturist was a dollhouse that the author saw on display in Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum* when she was on vacation. Made in 1689 for the real Petronella Oortman, the dollhouse was a detailed, elaborate, and precise replica of the Dutch woman’s own home. Fascinated by the exquisite furnishings for a doll’s house cost as much as the home in which it was displayed, Burton couldn’t help but wonder “Why?” That answer and her research led to The Miniaturist. more »
Rose Madeline Mula: Color Me Overwhelmed; Every Aspect of Life is Characterized by Multiple Choice, Even Kindergartners Must Choose Which Action Hero or Disney Princess Should Decorate Their Backpacks
Rose Madeline Mula writes: Every aspect of life today is characterized by multiple choice. The Bachelor and Bachelorette must decide which of twenty-five suitors would be the best mate. Kindergartners must choose which action hero or Disney princess should decorate their backpacks. Women have to determine which of dozens of costly wrinkle creams will live up to their hype. A far cry from the only skincare choice I had in my youth — Pond's Cold Cream at 25 cents a jar. Unfortunately, I’m a stress eater; so all of the decision-making I face in my day-to-day life inevitably leads me to ice cream — which only compounds the problem. Do you know how many flavors Baskin-Robbins offers these days?! more »