Above Trompe l'oeil is an art historical term which translates literally from French as “fool the eye.” In this long-practiced tradition, artists create images that are so finely detailed that they might at first be mistaken for “the thing itself.” Until recently, I had not heard of
Cornelius Norbertus Gijsbrechts, a seventeenth century Dutch painter. Not only was he an accomplished
trompe l’oeil practitioner, he could also be terribly funny. Reproduced above, for example, is his
The Reverse of a Framed painting (c1670), which is featured in an article on one of my favorite websites,
The Public Domain Review, which includes an essay on Gijsbrechts and a selection of his paintings.
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Ring Lardner,
TEETH AND HAIR TO DISAPPEAR, NOTES RING: Will Mean Radical Changes—Barbers and Magazine Proprietors to be Jobless—Highballs for Breakfast in the
Davenport Democrat and Leader (Davenport IA), March 1, 1925, p. 3—
The future man, says [a Harvard University professor], “is certain to lose his teeth because he don’t need them no more. The ape man used them to tear sinews and break nuts and etc., but civilization has done away with these conditions. Hair was given us by nature to protect us vs. cold, but now we have got coats and artificial covering. Man used to half to have toes, to help climb trees to escape from animals, but now he don’t need toes no more and can get along with a whole lot less fingers. The shape of the human skull and man’s erect position is designed to promote an increase in the size and weight of the brain.”
Well, friends set down a wile and ponder what all this means. It ain’t no wonder people will be wearing longer faces as they will be thousands and thousands throwed out of work. Without no teeth and no reason for teeth they won’t be no dentists and without no dentists they won’t be no factories for making them weapons that nobody but a dentist would dast use. And without no hair they won’t be no excuse for barber shops which means that all the barbers will not only be out of a job but they won’t have no place to talk and nobody to talk to.
Without hair and whiskers and teeth, they won’t be nobody advertising shampoo cream or shaving powder or toothpaste which means closing up a lot more factories to say nothing about shutting down all the magazines, which is now supported by the boys that advertises these implements. Any ways you can see the finish of same magazines which I don’t need to mention their names but the only place you ever find them, is at barbers and dentists.
With the barbers out of business they won’t be no shelter for manicure girls and besides when people only has one finger they ain’t going to pay no 50 cents or 75 cents for a manicure to say nothing about how is the gals going to wield their scissors and file and etc. with only one finger. Along with manicurists will go chiropodists because our feet is going to have even less toes than our hands and they won’t be no parking space for a corn let alone a bunion.
There is a few facts to be faced but they ain’t by no means all. Like for instance: What is to become of all the folks now employed in comb and brush factories? And what will women talk about when they ain’t got no hair? And who is going to provide for the boys that makes their bread and butter playing a clarinet or a horn or a harp or a violin and etc. The only musical instrument a person can play with one finger is the piano and one finger piano music ain’t libel to overcrowd the dance halls. How can Babe Ruth swing a bat or how can Vanco pitch a curve ball with one finger? And what is the coacher at first and third base going to holler when they can’t say “Be on your toes?”
A person will get up in the morning and thank heavens that they don’t half to have or comb their hair but it will take them just as long to dress if not longer because it is some trick to button things up with one finger and if you ain’t got no hair—why they’s so much more surface to wash and specially when you have longer faces.
Without no teeth you can’t have nothing for breakfast except soup or a couple of high balls and by that time the high balls probably won’t have much nourishment in them because the professor says that it is going to be anywheres from 40,000 to 75,000 years before all these changes takes place. After breakfast you go to whatever work a person can do with one finger and no toes. At lunch you can have some more soup or scotch then back to work and a big dinner at night consisting of soup and liquor. They will still be theaters in the evening but people who prefers revues and gal shows will be up against it for entertainment as nobody wants to open their mouth and sing when they ain’t go no teeth and Gilda Gray is the only dancer in the world that can perform without using her hands and feet.
As I say [the good professor] don’t expect all these evolutions and revolutions for 40,000 or 75,000 years and the big majority of us won’t hardily live that long so we should worry, but it would be kind of interesting to look on from the outside and see how the world rolls along under the new conditions. Personally I haven’t no idear what it would be like to have no fingers or toes, but from the start I have got it ain’t going to take me no 40,000 years or nowheres near that long to appreciate what it means to live without teeth and hair. Related Link
Roy R. Behrens and Paul D. Whitson, Mimicry, Metaphor and Mistake
