Stand Still, Bright Eyes - Preserving Memories in Victorian Times

On a crisp October Saturday in Michigan, the kind where thousands of Michiganders wash down hundreds of donuts with gallons upon gallons of apple cider, I stood with my daughter Sydney and my longtime friend Tina on the porch of a Victorian mansion. 

The home had been meticulously restored and opened to the public. Tina suggested we go there after reading that it had been decorated for Halloween. We rang the doorbell and were greeted by a gracious docent who began showing us through the home as she recounted its history. 

The photo shown us by the docent.

The decorations were modest, but charming, giving them an appeal anything more opulent might have lacked. Tiny orange lights wound around the banister in the main hall, and mannequins, wearing harlequin masks and vintage formalwear, appeared to be the ghostly guests at a soiree.  

The docent pointed out a framed photo of three people. I surmised it to be a daughter flanked by her parents. Her posture and facial expression struck me as a little apathetic until the docent said the girl may well have been dead. There were other similar photos around the room of what the docent explained were deceased Victorians, many propped up and seated with loved ones. I struggled to grasp why the Victorians would do this, then heard myself blurting out the words, "Why would the Victorians do this?" Shockingly, it was my daughter who replied.

"It's called Victorian-era postmortem photography," she explained. "Back then, photography was new, and people couldn't always afford to have pictures taken unless there was a good reason. Because the exposure time needed to take a photograph was so long, people looked blurry if someone took their picture walking in the park or something. Even if they moved just a little, they could look blurry. That's why so many of the photos from that period were portraits. And if someone died, a postmortem photo might be a family's only picture of them."

I peered into my daughter's serious brown eyes, searching for something that until that moment I never dreamed might be in there - the possessing spirit of a long-dead Victorian historian. 

“What she said,” grinned the docent. I nodded, dumbfounded, to the woman before returning my attention to Sydney and noticed for the first time, her striking resemblance to Wednesday Addams. 

"You're 19 - how did you know all that?" I asked.

She shrugged, and the braids I was suddenly imagining bounced a bit. 

"I read."  

I needed to get my mind off this new view of my daughter and onto something less unnerving - like propped-up dead Victorians. It wasn't photographing deceased family members - a common practice that continues to this day - that threw me. It was that I couldn't stop thinking about Weekend at Bernie's. But Syd's explanation made perfect sense. Victorians held a unique position in time, when photography was emerging and slowly becoming accessible to everyday people. Suddenly, I saw my reaction for what it was: flippant, judgmental, and based on ignorance.   

Later, I did some googling and found more photos said to be of deceased Victorians. These I found disturbing because the subjects were standing. Then I found a Wikipedia entry that read ". . . it is untrue that metal stands and other devices were used to pose the dead as though they were living." It said that photographers used armrests and devices sometimes called "Brady stands" to steady their living subjects, thus preventing the blurring Sydney had explained. According to Wikipedia, evidence of such a stand meant the subject was a living person. I was so happy to read that Wikipedia entry after seeing ...

If you're thinking about doing your own research on Victorian-era postmortem photography, be warned - it can be unsettling. It can also haunt you in more ways than one when cheerful teasers from Instagram pop up saying it's found more postmortem photography you might like. 

One of my eagle-eyed readers, Mari Collier, commented that the photo of the couple and baby is not of the Victorian era, noting the woman's dress and what appears to be a flash of knee. I'm leaving it here to prove some points. In addition to labeling the photo as Victorian, the caption beneath it said the baby's open eyes were painted on. Postmortem Victorian photography did sometimes have eyes drawn or painted onto prints or negatives. For argument's sake, let's say the photo was Victorian. Isn't it more likely that this was a living baby who had never seen a camera before and that the flash surprised him? 

For generations, parents have secretly harbored feelings of disappointment caused by pictures of their kids - case in point: the school photos my parents paid for year after year.

Victorian parents were simply the first to have that problem. 

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Rubenesque

Peter Paul Rubens appreciated voluptuous female forms. And as a female whose form flirts with voluptuousness (and has occasionally kissed it on the mouth and even married it), I appreciate him for appreciating it.

Rubens was a Flemish Baroque painter known for his flamboyant oils depicting big and beautiful women. Anyone who took Art History 101 knows that Rubens is the reason we have the term "Rubenesque" to describe amply built women. And actually, the definition of Rubenesque, according to Dictionary.com, is surprisingly complementary: ". . . having the physique associated with Rubens' portraits of women; plump and attractive."

Somewhere around 1626, Ruben's wife died, and four years later, he married Hélène Fourment, who modeled for him several times, including for the aptly titled, Portrait of Hélène Fourment. 

Looking at the painting, you can see that Hélène was Rubenesque. Despite clutching that whatever-it-is around herself, her attempt to cover up seems a bit half-hearted, and she isn't even all that covered. And her right arm, instead of concealing her breasts, seems to shove them up as if she's saying, "Take THIS! I mean, take THESE!"

I can't help liking Hélène who would probably tell you that if you have a problem with her body, including her cattywampus, boosted-up breasts, then you can just get out of the museum. Her husband would no doubt show you to the door. 

I wish I were that comfortable in my own skin, especially when my skin has more than the usual amount of me to cover.

Of course, throughout history, in a variety of cultures, good-sized women have been revered. Being heavier once equated to wealth, luxury, and leisure. Similarly, the reason many subjects of Baroque- and Renaissance-period paintings are pale is that a tan meant you might toil in a field every day. So, Rubens, with his affection for bigger women, wasn't alone. There would have been plenty of men sitting around the banquet table with him, raising a chalice to grand and pasty ladies.

Personally, I feel better when I'm not very heavy. I have more energy when I'm somewhere around a size eight or 10. But if you're a Rubenesque woman, and you feel good about yourself and you're healthy, then I say amen, sister!

But I admit that I'd love to have a modern-day Rubens walk up and beg me to model for him. I'd say no of course, all coy and blushing.