Back in August 2015, Dolldom featured a 16-inch Brikette doll by Vogue Doll Company in an entry that aimed to show the babe's charm. Titled Back-to-School with Brikette, the article addressed the doll's bad rap after being cast in 1963as Talky Tina in the Season Five, Episode Six ( titled "Living Doll") of the iconic TV show The Twilight Zone. What we wrote then, holds strong today: there's nothing wrong when a doll says no to a bully.
In today's entry, Dolldom wishes to address, and not at all in depth, why Brikette and dolls (or anthropomorphic figures in general) may sometimes elicit a reaction (clearly not from dollectors) that exemplifies the Freudian concept of the uncanny. Das Unheimliche, about which he wrote 105 year ago, is the fear of the inanimate coming to life. But what may for some be fear inducing, is, for others, a life-long fascination.
It's October and the days are getting shorter; what was once 7:00 pm is now 5:00 and the oaks are shedding their foglie with utter abandon. And because life is not always a party, we must, at times, make an effort to make a little happiness happen. To boot, October, not unlike Brikette, can also suffer from generalizations and assumptions based on it's end-of-the-month extravaganza, which is why Brikette, in her 22-inch iteration, invites you to partake of her October Fiesta! It's October and we can play still outdoors and not worry about being too cold!
For this entry, Brikette models one of her original outfits and a selection of garments acquired from The Doll Mercantile in Petaluma, California. A magical realm, The Doll Mercantile not only sells vintage dolls and dollhouses but also offers expert restoration services and a not-to-miss boutique where local dollectors and their traveling counterparts can take their dolls to try on fab garb.
May the leftover days of October bring you kindness, serenity, and the simple joys of doll play.
Seldom will Dolldom engage in expressing absolutes, as we accept that the appreciation of beauty, doll related or otherwise, will be subjective. But today's entry celebrating the tenth anniversary of the introduction of Séverine by Julian S. Kalinowski goes there.
Séverine, introduced in 2015, is for us a ten, not only for the beauty inherent in the labor of making a doll by hand, but also for the impact that her appearance had in making a rarity of fashion doll history accesible to many, for Séverine is Kalinowski's take on the very elusive Caprice, a French beauty produced from 1966 to 1970.
Kalinwoski did not just copy Caprice but rather reinterpreted the sculpt in hard plastic and proceeded to hand paint each face and hand coif each head individually and without replicating a prototype look, making each Séverine doll a one-of-a-kind creation. In so doing, Kalinowski spawned a mind-boggling array of countenances that took the dollector on dazzling journeys of character study. Who were these coded-as-women Séverine dolls? As varied as the looks were, the essential vibe of Séverine was that of a woman with a little (or perhaps a lot of) experience, a feeling that was invariably transmitted through the dolls' eyes. Yet in Kalinowski's hands, under-eye circles were never a sign of distress but a glamorous flaunting of their travails.
Séverine was also the first Kalinowski creation without a molded shoe so each doll was presented wearing a made-to-measure pump in black, white, or glittery transparent. Séverine's sartorial statement was richly varied with original designs by the ultra-talented LizRetros, Sylvia Campbell, Tania Lawrence, Rosina Haskell, Brian Blythe, and Juliet Wharton.
In retrospect, Séverine may be Kalinowski's chef d'oeuvre, for in her the dollector not only got a OOAK handmade doll but also a three-dimensional miniature painting. A real tour de force!
Let's celebrate Séverine once again!
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