Hello everyone, this is copied from my blog, but I thought it might be interesting for those of you with a fancy for avant-garde art!

When researching Aleksandr Blok's poem "The Twelve"/Двенадцать (1918) last term, I came across Yuri Annenkov's original illustration. (Images are quite shamelessly stolen as per usual, please refer to the site linked below).

Yuri Annenkov himself is famous for the many portraits he made of Russian socialites and intelligentsia in the period 1910-1920, in a unique style seemingly influenced by suprematism, cubism and neo-realism. He defected in the early 1920s and went to Paris, where he worked as a lauded costume and set designer for film and theatre until his death in 1974.

( Click for illustrations, with snippets from the poem. )

I hope it's O.K. to post these - I spent an hour screencapping this movie for the hair and outfits and I figured I may as well share them after spending all of that time capping it!



It's not the best movie that I've seen but Betty Grable is gorgeous! Plus, there are a couple of nice songs in it, too.

( +12 )

If you want to see the rest of the screencaps, you should be able to see them at my photobucket. If that doesn't work, let me know.

these two are from 1882 and 1887, but i think they are worth posting anyway.

Hey guys,

I was wondering if you could help me out with a Halloween costume that my guy friend and I have. We're both in England (I'm studying abroad and he's British) and he's always been interested in that 1950s/early '60s wholesome American couple where the star quarterback of the high school and the lead cheerleader walk through the halls arm in arm, don't watch movies at the drive-in, get married right after they graduate, etc. You know what I mean?

I've been searching for pictures so that he and I can get the looks down to a T but I don't know how to find the quarterback or the popular girl from that era in Google Images. Does anyone happen to know where I can find some without just copying the cast of Grease?

We're going for the most wholesome, innocently cute American couple ever, basically. I kind of think that the costumes from Grease were really cheesy/tacky and we can get even more realistic than that. Maybe more along the It's A Wonderful Life lines...

Any help/suggestions/images are appreciated!

Thanks :)

http://www.vam.ac.uk/microsites/cold-war-modern/
it's the link to the website of the current exhibition "Cold war modern"  at the "Victoria & Albert museum" in London. Browsing in it you can find many pictures....
(I can't go, so i hope someone will post a lot of other photographies...)
at the main site of the museum (http://www.vam.ac.uk/) there are many other wonderful things pertaining the scope of this community.

Hello guys! First post here - but a good one I hope. Enjoy! :)

All pictures come from the wonderful book "The Circus, 1870-1950" by TASCHEN, which contains about 900 other color and B&W vintage illustrations and photographs! It's a must-have for any circus lover.

More info about this incredible book can be found here. You can leaf through the book here, too.


( More under the cut! )

( here's some pictures of Amedeo Modigliani and Jeanne Hebuterne ) 


( here's some photos fo Amedeo Modigliani and Jeanne Hebuterne )( here's some pictures of Amedeo modigliani and Jeanne Hebuterne )</div></div>

Hosted at free image hosting.



( +36 pictures )

Japanese artist Atsuko Tanaka in the mid-'50's.
In the pictures above she's working on her installation "the doorbells" in occasion of the 1st Gutai exhibition, in 1955.
Below, she's wearing her "electric dress", during the 2nd Gutai exhibition, in 1956.
(copyrights are of the respective owners. These are low-resolution pics posted here for the right cause of retroaesthetics)

i found these great photos in the july 2008 issue glamour magazine (ripped out from the magazine left in the break-room at my job), they are modern but the styling is so retro.



( a few more scans )

One of my favourite vocal artists is French-born Juliette Gréco. Jean-Paul Sartre once said of her that she holds a million poems in her voice. With her long dark hair and leftist associations she became the muse of the French Rive gauche circle in the 1950s.



( More pictures and films beneath the cut )

I've made up some banners for spreading the word about this community, since people are more likely to be persuaded by pretty visuals than rambling words, eh?

Copy and paste the text anywhere you please. Stick it in comments on your friends' journals. E-mail one to your mom. Spread the word!

<a href="http://retroaesthetics.livejournal.com"><img border="1" src="http://i35.tinypic.com/fwrez9.jpg"></a>


<a href="http://retroaesthetics.livejournal.com"><img border="1" src="http://i38.tinypic.com/1vj7p.jpg"></a>


<a href="http://retroaesthetics.livejournal.com"><img border=1" src="http://i37.tinypic.com/1zdnhau.jpg"></a>

Thanks for continuing to post everyone.

-Hannah

Hello! I collect vintage photography, and am currently in love with the work by photographer Wingate Paine.

 


 

Recently I've been very interested in the life and death of Buddy Holly (or rather, the events surrounding his death). I'm sure most of you know that February 3, 1959, the day that Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. Richardson were killed, was immortalised as being "the Day the Music Died" in Don Maclean's song, American Pie. Although the song itself was released in 1971, it referenced much of the music scene of the late 50's and 60's. I found a youtube video that explains the significance of most of the lyrics and thought I'd post it here.



Further reading: http://www.fiftiesweb.com/crash.htm
http://www.fiftiesweb.com/amerpie-1.htm

Some of my favourite photos from the 1950's are by photographer Bruce Davidson. I love the way he captured youth and young love, and I find the photos really inspiring, so here is a small sampling of my personal picks from his series Brooklyn Gang.





( Brooklyn Gang )

More can be seen here: http://www.art-dept.com/artists/davidson/

JALOU gallery has an online archive in which you can browse every single edition of L'Officiel from 1921 to today. The earlier numbers are a veritable treasure trove in vintage advertising, fashion and articles.

Hello all! I would love for everyone to start posting and I can't wait for this place to get active.
If you could all tag your posts, that would be awesome.

Here is the tags list: http://community.livejournal.com/retroaesthetics/tag/

Please choose from those when you tag your posts for easier access and archiving. Thank you!

Some guidelines about tagging:
- If you're posting photos, please tag with photography.
- If you're posting anything from youtube, please tag as videos
- Try and tag the dates that your post is covering, i.e. 1900s, 1940s, etc.
- If there is a tag on the list that doesn't fit your post, tag it with misc., and I'll look it over and see if a new tag needs to be added to the list.
Thanks!

-Hannah

condé nast has a store where you can purchase prints, which is very fun to browse.
--
( some of my favorites )


these are all from house & garden under photographs.