Anonymous Photographer Pets of the Ballet ca. 1865 hand-colored albumen silver prints (stereograph) Getty Museum, Los Angeles |
Léon Bakst Costume Design for Bacchante in Narcisse (Ballets Russes) ca. 1911-16 halftone reproduction of gouache on paper (book illustration) New York Public Library |
Cecil Beaton Costume Sketches for Les Illuminations choreographed by Frederick Ashton ca. 1950 drawing Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
Albrecht Dürer Masquerade Dance with Torches ca. 1516 woodcut National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
Alfeo Faggi Ballet Dancer 1931 watercolor Princeton University Art Museum |
Paul Gavarni Costume for the ballet Stradella ca. 1837 lithograph Yale University Art Gallery |
Paul Gavarni Costume for the ballet Stradella ca. 1837 lithograph Yale University Art Gallery |
Harry Lachmann Backstage before a performance of Parade (Ballets Russes costume by Pablo Picasso) 1917 gelatin silver print Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
Harry Lachmann Backstage before a performance of Parade (Ballets Russes costume by Pablo Picasso) 1917 gelatin silver print Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
Pierre La Mésangère (publisher) Les Préparatifs du Bal ca. 1801-1802 hand-colored etching (fashion plate) British Museum |
Pierre La Mésangère (publisher) La Walse ca. 1800 hand-colored etching (fashion plate) British Museum |
Wellington Lee Dance with Candles 1949 gelatin silver print Minneapolis Institute of Art |
George Platt Lynes A Balanchine Ballet before 1955 gelatin silver print Yale University Art Gallery |
Henri Matisse Ballet Dancer 1927 lithograph Art Institute of Chicago |
Robert Montenegro Vaslav Nijinsky in Carnaval (Ballets Russes) ca. 1912 drawing, with gouache (print study) Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
Robert Montenegro Vaslav Nijinsky in Daphnis and Chloe (Ballets Russes) 1912 hand-colored print Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
from Terra Nullius
The poem in which we drive an hour to the beach and Uncle Dave doesn't get out
of his lawn chair once.
The poem in which we left the yellow plastic shovel behind and everyone is bereft.
The poem in which I can't stop talking about how you walked deep into Lake Erie
and the water was still only up to your knees when you turned into a speck
past the rock jetty.
The poem in which everyone listens to celebrity gossip in the car on the way back.
The poem in which I pontificate on how ugly the fiancée of that Jonas brother is,
and how they're too young to get married, and how my grandmother's old
neighbor would have said, "Ugly? She can't help that she's ugly. It's that she's
so stupid," and I would have yelled at her for assuming that all former hair-
dressers are dim.
The poem in which I turn into my grandmother's old neighbor.
The poem in which I remember very clearly how they both stored tissues in their
bras.
The poem in which I think about how this would horrify your mother – the
pendulous breasts, the moist tissues, the dipping into the cleavage to retrieve
anything.
The poem in which your mother tries not to wince when I order whatever I want
from the menu despite her coupon for two medium 1-topping pizzas.
– Erika Meitner (2014)