I hope those of you who are regular readers don’t mind too much when I wander outside the bounds of the City when I think there is something interesting happening elsewhere, and in the case of the Wellcome Collection it’s only a few Tube stops away.
At the entrance to the Cult of Beauty exhibition …
The guide tells us that the exhibition explores notions of beauty across time and cultures. ‘Around the world, beauty is constantly seen as an ideal worthy of going to great lengths to achieve. But what are the driving forces that lead us to believe in a myth of universal beauty, despite its evolving nature?’
‘Featuring over 200 items, including historical objects, artworks, films and new commissions, the exhibition considers the influence of morality, status, health, age, race and gender on the evolution of ideas about beauty.’
Reproduction of the bust of Nefertiti, originally created circa 1354-1351 BCE …
‘An archytype of African feminine beauty’.
‘Beautiful features have long been seen as a gateway to the spiritual in different belief systems. The print of Krishna challenges Christian associations of beauty with morals such as chastity’ …
‘The Virgin of Guadalupe is a symbol of multicultural and multi-ethnic identities, especially in areas where different religions and cultural traditions meet’ …
The ‘Esquiline Venus’ and the ‘Idolino’ or ‘Little Idol’ – First Century concepts of beauty reproduced in the late 19th century …
‘Husbands bringing their ugly wives to a windmill, to be transformed into beautiful women’ – German chapbook circa 1650 …
Trying to get that figure in shape …
It was not just women enduring torture …
A dandy being laced into a tight corset by two servants (1819).
Cosmetic entrepreneur Helena Rubenstein testing products in her Long Island Factory (1950s) …
The installation ‘Beauty Sensorium’ brings together historical references with reconstructions of Renaissance make-up recipes, inviting visitors to look, smell and touch …
Equipment to enhance appearance and fragrance …
More like a surgeon’s travelling kit …
‘Narcissister’s three-metre-tall hanging sculpture ‘(Almost) all of my dead mother’s beautiful things’ centres on the crushing weight of beauty ideals that are passed from one generation to another’ …
‘Makeupbrutalism’s multimedia installation ‘It makes no sense being beautiful if no one else is ugly’ encourages us to question our beliefs, confront our raw selves beneath social pressure and to peel back the layers of the beauty industry’ …
What represents beauty changes all the time …
This 1970s product made me smile …
And on the Underground going home later, I had to smile again when I looked up and saw this (plus ça change) …
It is a provocative and thoughtful exhibition and I enjoyed it very much.
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