“Heirloom” Pop-Up Art Book by Alison Ann Woodward unfolds piece by piece to reveal the anatomy of a white horned creature.

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Decaying flowers, photographed by Billy Kidd.

(Source: billykidd)

Daylesford, Victoria Australia 

Decaying rose shot by Billy Kidd, using a Canon EOS 5D Mark II.

The awesomely insane Heaven and Hell nightclubs of 1890s Paris.

In modern times, you can find a stray cabaret or goth club in most modern metropolitan areas. But back in the late 19th century, your options were limited, albeit merrily deranged. Paris of the 1890s had several supernatural nightlife options, each of them with marvelously outlandish gimmicks.

At this gothic nightspot, visitors pondered their own mortality as they drank on coffins and were served libations (named after diseases) by monks and funeral attendees. Recalls Morrow:

“Large, heavy, wooden coffins, resting on biers, were ranged about the room in an order suggesting the recent happening of a frightful catastrophe. The walls were decorated with skulls and bones, skeletons in grotesque attitudes, battle-pictures, and guillotines in action. Death, carnage, assassination were the dominant note, set in black hangings and illuminated with mottoes on death Bishop said that he would be pleased with a lowly bock. Mr. Thompkins chose cherries a l’eau-de-vie, and I, une menthe. One microbe of Asiatic cholera from the last corpse, one leg of a lively cancer, and one sample of our consumption germ!” moaned the creature toward a black hole at the farther end of the room. Some women among the visitors tittered, others shuddered, and Mr. Thompkins broke out in a cold sweat on his brow, while a curious accompaniment of anger shone in his eyes. Our sleepy pallbearer soon loomed through the darkness with our deadly microbes, and waked the echoes in the “Drink, Macchabees!” he wailed: “drink these noxious potions, which contain thvilest and deadliest poisons!”

But Cabaret du Néant wasn’t the only creepy nightspot in Paris. Later in Bohemian Paris of To-day, Morrow described his evening at the Cabaret de l’Enfer (“The Cabaret of the Inferno”), a Satanically themed nightclub in Montmartre that abutted another cabaret. And according to the author’s account, it was perhaps the trippiest hangout of La Belle Époque:

“”Enter and be damned, the Evil One awaits you!” growled a chorus of rough voices as we hesitated before the scene confronting us. Near us was suspended a caldron over a fire, and hopping within it were half a dozen devil musicians, male and female, playing a selection from “Faust” on stringed instruments, while red imps stood by, prodding with red-hot irons those who lagged in their performance. Crevices in the walls of this room ran with streams of molten gold and silver, and here and there were caverns lit up by smouldering fires from which thick smoke issued, and vapors emitting the odors of a volcano. Flames would suddenly burst from clefts in the rocks, and thunder rolled through the caverns. Red imps were everywhere, darting about noiselessly, some carrying beverages for the thirsty lost souls, others stirring the fires or turning somersaults. Everything was in a high state of motion.”

And right next door to the Cabaret de l’Enfer was Cabaret du Ciel (“The Cabaret of the Sky”), a divinely themed bar where Dante and Father Time greeted visitors and comely ladies dressed as angels pranced around teasing patrons. As Morrow recalled, the evening’s entertainment was presided over by St. Peter himself, who anointed the boozy crowd:

“Flitting about the room were many more angels, all in white robes and with sandals on their feet, and all wearing gauzy wings swaying from their shoulder-blades and brass halos above their yellow wigs. These were the waiters, the garcons of heaven, ready to take orders for drinks. One of these, with the face of a heavy villain in a melodrama and a beard a week old, roared unmelodiously, “The greetings of heaven to thee, brothers! Eternal bliss and happiness are for thee. Mayst thou never swerve from its golden paths! Breathe thou its sacred purity and renovating exaltation. Prepare to meet thy great Creator and don’t forget the garcon!”[Later], without the slightest warning, the head of St. Peter, whiskers and all, appeared in a hole in the sky, and presently all of him emerged, even to his ponderous keys clanging at his girdle. He gazed solemnly down upon the crowd at the tables and thoughtfully scratched his left wing. From behind a dark cloud he brought forth a vessel of white crockery (which was not a wash-bowl) containing (ostensibly) holy water. After several mysterious signs and passes with his bony hands he generously sprinkled the sinners below with a brush dipped in the water; and then, with a parting blessing, he slowly faded into mist.”

more at http://io9.com/5910963/the-awesomely-insane-heaven-and-hell-nightclubs-of-1800s-paris

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His mate was seriously injured after she was hit by a car as she swooped low across the road. He brought her food and tended to her with love and compassion.He brought her food again but was shocked to find her dead. He then tried to move her….a rarely-seen effort for swallows. Aware that his mate is dead, he cries with adoring love. He stood beside her body with sadness and sorrow.People cried after seeing these pictures when they were published in the leading newspaper in France. All copies of the paper were sold out on the day the pictures were released.

And many people think animals don’t have emotions.

The kiss of death.

This astonishing sculpture forms part of Barcelona’s Poblenou Cemetery.  The Kiss of Death (El Petó de la Mort in Catalan and El beso de la muerte in Spanish) dates back to 1930. A winged skeleton bestows a kiss on the lips of a handsome young man: is it ecstasy on his face or resignation? Little wonder the sculpture elicits strong and varying responses from whoever gazes upon it.

(Source: mournfully)

Several common themes run through the acts of murderers known as “rippers.” Most salient is that they violently mutilate or literally rip their victims open and often dismember them. Most, but not all, ripper murderers select prostitutes as their victims. Jack the Ripper, in late 19th-century London, was particularly proficient at mutilating and disemboweling his victims. Often, these types of murders are committed in an uncontrollable rage leading to exceptionally violent acts. For example, in the 1970s, Peter Sutcliffe, the “Yorkshire Ripper,” mutilated his victims and left bite marks, later used to link him to the crime. Rippers may also engage in cannibalism. Ripper murderers take advantage of their victims’ accessibility as well as their lifestyles, which often makes them difficult to track. For instance, prostitutes may go missing, unnoticed, for long periods of time. The Yorkshire Ripper explained to his younger brother that his motive for his violent murders was to clean up the streets and rid them of prostitutes; his savage mutilation of his victims demonstrates the rage and anger he felt towards women. The opinion that prostitutes were somehow to blame for their victimization was likely shared by some members of the public. 

Memento mori skull ring, around 1600-1625.

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did-you-kno:

Image:A fourth-century B.C. Phoenician mask found in Tunisia displays a grin not unlike those seen on victims of an ancient Phoenician “sardonic grin” potion administered on the island of Sardinia.

Scientists in May 2009 said they had finally uncovered the source of the potion’s lethal, smile-inducing effects: the hemlock water-dropwort plant.

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