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| Marcus Geeraerts the Younger Captain Thomas Lee garbed as Irish Foot-Soldier 1594 oil on canvas Tate Britain |
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| Pieter de Jode after Sebastian Vrancx Fashionable Woman of Milan ca. 1600 engraving Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Vienna |
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| Giacomo Franco Study of the Apparel of a Doge ca. 1610 drawing (print study) British Museum |
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| Joseph Werner the Younger Mademoiselle de La Vallière in Costume ca. 1663 gouache on vellum (cabinet miniature) Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, California |
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| Georg Melchior Kraus Gentleman's Costume 1786 hand-colored engraving Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |
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| Natalia Goncharova Stage Costume for Peasant Woman 1914 gouache on paper National Gallery of Australia, Canberra |
-c1916-silk-and-cotton-National-Gallery-of-Australia-Canberra.jpg) |
| Natalia Goncharova (designer) Stage Costume for Ballets Russes Seahorse ca. 1916 silk and cotton National Gallery of Australia, Canberra |
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| Michel Larionov Stage Costume for Mechanical Peacock 1919 pochoir Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami |
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| Alexandre Benois Stage Costume for a Merchant ca. 1920 watercolor and ink on paper National Gallery of Australia. Canberra |
-by-Jeanne-Paquin-for-Cecily-Byrne-in-Not-In-Our-Stars-at-Wyndham's-Theatre-London-1924-silk-brocade-Victoria-&-Albert-Museum-London.jpg) |
| Jeanne Paquin Stage Costume for Cecily Byrne Not in Our Stars Wyndham's Theatre, London 1924 silk brocade Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
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| Alfred Cheney Johnston Marjorie Merriweather Post in Court Presentation Costume 1929 gelatin silver print National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC |
-c1930-40-gelatin-silver-print-North-Carolina-Museum-of-Art-Raleigh.jpg) |
| Eudora Welty Pageant of Birds (Farish Street Baptist Church, Jackson, Mississippi) ca. 1930-40 gelatin silver print North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh |
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| Charles Ricketts Costume Study for Cardinal ca. 1935 graphite and watercolor on paper Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton, New Brunswick |
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| Robert Remsen Vickrey Illustration for Great Ideas of Western Man Series 1964 tempera on board (study for poster by Container Corp. of America) Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC |
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| Anonymous American Designer Movie Costume for Diana Ross as Billie Holiday 1972 wool twill with fur trim National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington DC |
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| Leon Levinstein New Orleans Mardi Gras 1975 gelatin silver print Whitney Museum of American Art, New York |
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| Oscar de la Renta Stage Costume for Whitney Houston 1986 patterned silk with beaded cuffs National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington DC |
from House-Guest
The sad seamstress
who stays with us this month
is small and thin and bitter.
No one can cheer her up.
Give her a dress, a drink,
roast chicken, or fried fish –
it's all the same to her.
She sits and watches TV.
No, she watches zigzags.
"Can you adjust the TV?"
"Can you adjust the TV?"
"No," she says. No hope.
She watches on and on,
without hope, without air.
Her own clothes give us pause,
but she's not a poor orphan.
She has a father, a mother,
and all that, and she's earning
quite well, and we're stuffing
her with fattening foods.
We invite her to use the binoculars.
We say, "Come see the jets!"
We say, "Come see the baby!"
Or the knife grinder who cleverly
plays the National Anthem
on his wheel so shrilly.
Nothing helps.
She speaks: "I need a little
money to buy buttons."
She seem to think it's useless
to ask. Heavens, buy buttons,
if they'll do any good,
the biggest in the world –
by the dozen, by the gross!
Buy yourself an ice cream,
a comic book, a car!
Her face is closed as a nut,
closed as a careful snail
or a thousand-year-old seed.
Does she dream of marriage?
Of getting rich? Her sewing
is decidedly mediocre.
– Elizabeth Bishop (1956)