Private view at the Pump House Gallery in Battersea Park next Wednesday, 14 March. From then on it will be open until the 15th of May.

More information here: http://www.delfinafoundation.com/news.php#news251

Leave a comment

Hailed as one of the most notorious erotic novels of all times, Story of O follows the beautiful young Parisian woman as she falls into the fateful clutches of her lover’s sadomasochistic urges. She submits to the life of a slave and surrenders herself completely to the terrifying bonds of desire. The book was written in 1954 by the French author Anne Desclos under the nom de plume of Pauline Réage and in 2000 it was illustrated by the Italian comics artist Guido Crepax.

‘Keep me rather in this cage, and feed me sparingly, if you dare. Anything that brings me closer to illness and the edge of death makes me more faithful. It is only when you make me suffer that I feel safe and secure. You should never have agreed to be a god for me if you were afraid to assume the duties of a god, and we all know that they are not as tender as all that. You have already seen me cry. Now you must learn to relish my tears.’

Leave a comment

Occasionally when people are struck by lightening and survive their skin is semi permanently scared with a lightening like scar. The scientific word for this is a ‘Lichtenberg figure‘ but it is more commonly known as a lightning flower. These beautiful and organic shapes are also relatively lethal and are commonly used to signify the cause of someones death. They are thought to be caused by the rupture of small capillaries under the skin due to the passage of the lightning current from the lightning discharge as it flashes over the skin.

However, there have been numerous cases of survivors, some only experiencing the scars on their bodies for a couple of hours before disappearing, but last summer a man in Texas experienced his for well over a month.

You can read his story here. Apparently he didn’t even realise he’d been struck by lightning….

 

Leave a comment

The incredible photographs by Diane Arbus are about to reside in the Fotomuseum in Zurich until the end of May. Two hundred photographs will be on display showing Arbus’s world of couples, children, carnival performers, nudists, middle-class families, transvestites, zealots, eccentrics, and celebrities. Arbus’s spectacular ability to showcase a total honesty in her subjects found around New York still remain unbeatable in originality, as well as existing as a piece of amazing 20th century American history.

Find out more here:http://www.fotomuseum.ch

The exhibition runs from the 3rd of March until the 28th of June 2012

 

Leave a comment

Olive Oatman was kidnapped from her Mormon family in the Gila River (present-day Arizona) by the Yavapai Indians, while her family were traveling across the South West of America in 1851.
Most of her family were murdered but her and her sister, Mary-Ann were kidnapped by the Yavapai. After receiving harsh treatment by them for a year she was ransomed by a band of Mohaves. Olive went on to be accepted into the Mohave lifestyle and spent four years living with them. This was most famously acknowledged with her blue chin tattoo.
Mohaves considered tattoos to be a form of identification in the afterlife. The tattoo was secured by pricking the skin in small regular rows with a cactus pine until the skin bled freely. The cactus spikes were then dipped in weed juice and blue stone powder which was then applied to the pinpricks on the face. These chin tattoos indicated that the woman was ready to embark in adult tribal life.
Chin designs with the Mohaves were chosen by the tattooists and were based on the shape of the face. Narrow faced people usually wore designs of narrow lines or dots to accentuate the length of the face. Patterns for broad faces tended to have wider lines and cover more of the chin, making the face look even broader.
Olive was ransomed in 1856 by the United States Government at Ft. Yuma. On her discovery she was apparently found in nothing but a skirt made of bark which fueled suspicions of debauchery and sexual exploits.  Considering her puritanical upbringing, Olive’s experience was deemed as outrageous. An ambitious Methodist minister named Royal Byron Stratton wrote a scandalous book about her story which was named Olive and Mary Ann. The book sold 30,000 copies, a huge best-seller for that era. Rumours of her mothering two children by the chief’s son circulated but she denied this thoroughly.

Her story gripped the country so much that in the 1880′s, the “tattooed captive” became a popular circus theme. Their stories turned provocatively, on the notion that people of colour could transform whites into people of colour  ethnically and decoratively, as a means of exploitation and degradation.
Images and stories of Oatman’s tattoo fed the new America’s fear and ignorance’s towards the First World. In many ways Olive’s tattoo has captured a rather colonial view of the First World as terrifying primitives. Rather than a rather uplifting story of acceptance of this new culture and lifestyle bestowed upon her. Olive often proclaimed her love for the Mohaves in interviews and her brother indicated that she would weep night after night after leaving them. It has been said that she was the first white woman in America’s recorded history to have a tattoo.
Much material written about Olive appears to be confused and sensational but a  comprehensive book, The Blue Tattoo has recently been written about Olive’s life. Check it out here.

Leave a comment

 

The classic Belle de Jour will be having a matinee showing at the beautiful art deco Rio cinema in Dalston, London this Sunday.

You can buy tickets here and find out more: http://www.riocinema.org.uk/

Leave a comment

We’re having a party in Paris for Fashion Week.

Djs:
Raphaël (MEGAFORCE) & Julien Dechery
DORIAN MALIBU 1992
PIPI DE FRECHE
(see below for more details about our djs!)

l’Etablissement se réserve le droit d’entrée x
COME EARLY!

RSVP: rsvp@novembremagazine.com

 

Chacha Club,
47 rue Berger
75001 Paris

 

xxx
xxx
xxx

Raphaël (MEGAFORCE) & Julien Dechery
Raphaël is part of the collective MEGAFORCE, 4 video directors, who just directed the last Madonna video:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/MEGAFORCE/96674497662

DORIAN MALIBU 1992:
http://malibu1992.tumblr.com/

PIPI DE FRECHE:
Dj for Flash Cocotte:
http://www.flashcocotte.com/
http://www.cremedefreche.com/

Leave a comment