Sunday Safari - Gelatinous Beauties

Liebig trade card, thanks to Agence eureka

Fresco by Galileo Chini, ca. 1925

 Tiffany Bozic

Aly De Groot

Minouette

 Alissa Coe and Carly Waito

 Plankton Art Co.

Miki Sato

Claire Fauché

 Clemens Habicht

Itakura Tadanori

Sebastiano Ranchetti

Bozka

Pascaline Rey

 Leo Lionni, illustration from Swimmy, 1964

Sunday Safari - Blacker than the Night

1940s Vintage Cardboard Halloween Die cut Decoration, thanks to Halloween guy


Happy Halloween to everyone! (especially black cat lovers)

Arthur Rackham illustration for Grimm's Fairy Tales,
thanks to ASIFA-Hollywood animation archive

 The Black Cat movie poster, 1934, thanks to This isn't Happiness

 Jenny Dalenoord Wiplala cover, 1958, thanks to art.crazed

 The Alarm of the Black Cat cover, 1942, via She Blogged By Night

 Tomb of Ligeia movie poster via wellmedicated

 Dick Bruna cover from Bruna's great set by juliensart on flickr

 Mas Negro que la Noche movie poster, 1975, thanks to Martin Klasch

Frans Haacken illustration from Peter und der Wolf, 1958, thanks to Arthur van Kruining

 Emanuel Schongut cover, 1960s

 Pablo Amargo poster

Los gatos con Mercè, Yolanda Mosquera

Cheap Thrills

 Evil Bunny, c. 1930’s, waxed, painted buckram with cotton tie

Phyllis Galembo is an American photographer and professor

who for the past 20 years has been documenting ritual costumes,

masks and masquerades across Africa and Latin America.

From the impressive and extensive portfolio showcased on her website,

this is a small sample of a series of charming and strangely spooky 

vintage Halloween costumes ranging from the 19th century to the 1960s.

 They were part of Dressed for Thrills: Halloween and Masquerade Costumes,

an exhibition originally hosted at F.I.T. Museum, New York in 2003.

Bongo Bear, c. 1930’s / early-1940’s, cotton flannel costume, buckram mask, 

Spotlite Costume manufactured by A.S.Fishbach, NYC.

Big Bad Wolf, c. 1939, painted buckram mask, cotton shirt and pants, 

cotton-covered wire tail, manufactured by A.S. Fishbach, NYC.

Hep Cats, early 1950’s, rayon jumpsuits, plastic mask (one with bells),
manufactured by Ben Cooper. 

Red Riding Hood, c. 1941, cotton skirt with printed illustrations of Red Riding Hood story
trimmed with gold ribbon, cotton cake, manufactured by Collegeville Costumes. 
Brown Bear, c. 1940's, painted buckram mask with cotton jumpsuit, manufacturer unknown.

Mad Men & Crazy Critters, 7th episode: Freshly Packed

King Pelican Lettuce, circa 1920

My original plans for today's posting changed when I arrived by chance at Box of Apples, the online museum and gift shop of fruit crate labels from the 1900-1950s era. This well done and clever website is a spin-off of Plan59.com, a great online museum dedicated to mid-century illustration (both sites haven't been updated for quite a while, but hopefully they are alive and well). Being a sucker for ephemera, I suddenly realized there's been too little of it on Animalarium since last November's post on matchbox labels. And on this hot afternoon those plump and juicy vintage fruits and vegetables look terribly inviting, even without the addition of crazy crate critters...

Boyhood Grapefruit, circa 1920s

Mountain Goat Apples, circa 1920s

Golden Eagle Oranges, circa 1930s

Venice Cove Oranges, circa 1930s

Antonio Escandell Oranges, circa 1940s

Scotty's Best Pears, 1940s

Piggy Pears, circa 1940s

Tie-It-On Apples, circa 1940s

Coon Sweet Potatoes, circa 1940s

Then for some reason, around the 1950s veggies turn aggressive,

as you can see:

Up n'Atom Carrots, circa 1950s

Killer Vegetables, circa 1950s

for more bright and extravangant vintage crate labels, 

head to Box of Apples' plentiful galleries!

An Antique Treasure Chest

Illustration from medieval French manuscript

I love how I can always rely on the web for interesting discoveries and pleasant surprises.

 From awesome artists I had never heard about, to wonderful blogs and information 

resources, I can find it all in the comfort of my studio, at any time I please, for the small

 price of an ADSL connection. I try to remember not to take this for granted, and to be 

grateful to the countless people who in their personal way contribute to this incredible 

and ever growing public repository of knowledge and art. Having worked in the past as an

 iconographic researcher in the publishing field, I know well how hard it used to be to 

find images for specific projects without having to pay high prices to agencies or spend 

hours looking around in dusty bookstores (by the way, I do enjoy dusty bookstores).

Medieval illustration from beekeeping manuscript

Blue kingfisher and lilies from Livre de Fleur, 1620

Illustration by Mark Catesby from History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands, 1780

This morning, when thanks to Tumblr I came upon vintageprintable.com, I reacted with 

the classic "How come I haven't seen this before?". The website, as the name implies, 

hosts a huge collection of downloadable and printable public domain images. The animal

 section alone contains hundreds of variously catalogued images, from medieval

 bestiaries to Buffon, from Japanese prints to 1960s stamps. The kind of stuff one can 

usually find in Dover books, great for collages, crafts, and overall inspiration, but in a 

free digital format. The project is the brainchild of Swivelchair, a biopharma professional

 with the hobby of curating out-of-copyright scientific illustration.

Elephant and Zebra from Infants cabinet of Birds and Beasts, 1820

Echidna from Complements de Buffon, 1838

Ink wash illustration from Jean Baptiste Vérany's

Mèmoire sur deux nouvelles espèces de Céphalopodes trouvées dans l'océan, 1839

Butterflies from Oriental Entomology by J. O. Westwood, 1848

Indian snake charmers, 18th-19th century

Plate from Haeckel's Kunstformen der Natur, 1904

(one of my favorite illustrated books ever)

Cover of A Cat Alphabet by Louis Wain, 1910

Brothers Grimm German stamp, 1963

All images in this post are a semi-random selection of things found at vintage printable.

Go take a look and try not to get lost; there's a lot more to see.