Curiosity

Museum of Sex, Manhatten, NY

Museum of Ramen Noodles, Japan

UFO Museum, Roswell, New Mexico

Cabinets of Curiosity in St. Augustine

Robert Ripley, 1889 - 1949, American.
Traveled the world collecting the exotic.

Ripley was a cartoonist.

A contemporary advertisement for the museum.
The museum is located on San Marco Avenue in St. Augustine.

A recent addition to the Ripley collection.  Link here to see and read more.

Franklin Smith, 1826 - 1911.
Abolitionist, proponent for Washington D.C., travels and collects.

Villa Zorayda, located here in St. Augustine.
Built by Smith in 1883, inspired by travel to Spain, Egypt, Morocco.
Fantasy architecture in Florida.

Anna Maria Grosholtz (Madame Tussaud)
1761, France - 1850, England.
Wax artist.  Established first wax museum in England.

Established 1948.  Potter's Wax Museum is located in St. Augustine 
and was the first wax museum in United States.
Link here to view website.

Wax heads of those deceased displayed in home.
Anatomy Act of 1832 in Britian
"More and more teaching was done with wax models....The whole bodies that were produced were nearly all of women.  Many of those made towards the end of the eighteenth century were sold in Britai, France and elsewhere as 'Venuses'.  Their faces were beautiful, their 'skin' was coloured and tehy had eyelashes and flowing long hair.  Their bodies opened to reveal body parts, particularly foetuses.  The 'Venus' was displayed lying invitingly on silk or velvet cushions, and was often decorated with a pearl necklace.  Few whole male bodies were made.  Males had no wax 'flesh' or clothes and were always shown upright to demonstrate the position of muscles and bones.  Perhaps the difference was intended to show that men were good for action, but women only to reproduce and be ornamental."  -source is Madame Tussaud: The History of Wax Works by Pamela Pilbeam.  Chapter 1, The History of Wax Modeling.  Link here.

Wax models by Joseph Towne (1806 - 1879, British).
Many of his models are on display at Guy Hospital in London.
More info and image on The History Blog.  Link here.

Wax Model Doll

With their capacity to titillate as well as educate, anatomical models became sought-after curiosities, displayed not only in dissecting rooms but also in sideshows and the curiosity cabinets of wealthy Victorian gentlemen.  For a small admission fee, visitors seeking an unusual afternoon's entertainment could bisit displays of these strange dolls in London, Paris, Brussels and Barcelona.  -source is Welcom Collection.  Link here.

Cabinets of Curiosity

Cabinets of Curiosity - encyclopedic collection, Renaissance Europe, objects yet to be defined.
The term cabinet originally described a private room, usually for a man, used early modern Europe.
Renaissance - "reborn", a cultural movement, 14th - 17th century, began in Italy and spread to rest of Europe, observation - linear perspective and science, politics - diplomacy, humanism.
Humanism - reacts against utilitarian, civic life, often included women, grammar, history, poetry, moral philosophy.

Ole Worm, 1588 - 1655, Danish physician

Ferrante Imperato, an apothecary of Naples.  Engraving from 1599.

Engraving

Engraving

Painted in 1636.

Shells and Coral

Before photography.  Drawings to document, illustrate written text of findings.

"No-one, gazing upon the multiplicity of natural productions, could fail to worship God in His Creation. "

"As in other late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century natural histories, butterflies and other metamorphosing insects became analogies for the Christian transfiguration of the human body at the Resurrection; Vincent boasted that his cabinet contained every species described in Maria Sibylla Merian’s book on the subject."  -source is Scientific Symmetries by EC Spary.  Link to pdf article here. 


"[H]istorian Roelof van Gelder distinguishes five different motives which, [to] varying degrees, played a role in inspiring Dutch citizens to build up a collection. Firstly, the possessor of a rich and beautiful cabinet could acquire a good reputation, because he could be sure of important guests entering his house. Secondly, the collected valuables could serve simultaneously as merchandise and as investments. Thirdly, the collected objects, besides contributing to the collection, could generate a certain aesthetic satisfaction. Fourthly, the religious consideration that man could learn to know God better through the study of of his Creation played a substantial role for some Dutch collectors. As a fifth reason van Gelder mentions scientific curiosity, deriving from the humanistic ideal of the universal scholar."- source is Neat Nature: The Relation Between Nature and Art in a Dutch Cabinet of Curiosities from the Early Eighteenth Century.  Link here. 


The source for above images and information came from the blog Bible Odyssey. Link here.