Gothic Asylum... ♰

I have found an article online that intrigued me... It talks about and shows portrait from an asylum in the 1800's. Photographs were taken at West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum by chief neurologist Sir James Crichton-Browne.

These kind of stills from the past make me feel like I understand more about the atmosphere of gothic horror as it really does give me chills. It is shocking how far we have come when it comes to technology invented and types of medicines and therapies used. Forced into a head brace, bound and held up by police officers, or sitting down with their eyes rolled back in their heads - these are the harrowing faces of mental illness in the Victorian era.

"Diagnosed with conditions such as ‘imbecility,’ ‘simple mania,’ and ‘acute melancholia’, all of them were patients at the West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum, Yorkshire, in 1869.

But while some of their treatment may appear barbaric by modern standards, this asylum, its founder William Tuke, and chief neurologist Sir James Crichton-Browne, actually paved the way for ethical treatment of the mentally ill.

   

Pictures included in this article, taken in 1869 at the West Riding Pauper Launatic Asylum near Wakefield, Yorkshire, show some of the patients interred there. While some of the treatment looks barbaric to modern eyes, in fact the centre pioneered the way for ethical treatment of the mentally ill.

                                 
     

The photographs are part of a 5,000-strong collection of detailed documents on patients taken by Sir James Crichton-Browne, the chief neurologist at West Riding, who helped lead the way in medical treatment of mental disorders.

The West Riding Asylum, based near Wakefield, was the first institution of its kind in the UK to take those with mental conditions out of the way of regular society to a place of relative protection. To that end, the hospital-come-boarding house was entirely self-sufficient, housing its own bakery, butchery, dairy, shop and laundry.

Previously those with mental disorders were exhibited in bedlams, such as the famous one in London, imprisoned in cells, or chained to walls in workhouses. This new, relatively compassionate approach was driven by the asylum's founder, William Turk, a Quaker who believed in the sanctity of life and of behaving kindly and morally to all of humanity.

Sir Crichton-Browne (pictured right) also used the security of the asylum to begin his groundbreaking research into mental illness, investigating whether there was a biological cause behind the conditions he help to diagnose.

He helped to take some of these portraits of patients, meticulously labelled with notes on the patient’s appearance and ailments, and three years later collaborated with Charles Darwin on his book ‘The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals.’

Crichton-Browne pioneered a medical approach to the treatment of mental disorders at West Riding, banning the use of restraints unless necessary, keeping sedation to a minimum, and allowing patients to indulge in leisure activities and take up jobs as part of their healing process.

He also published in-depth journals from his time at West Riding containing observations from himself and his team on mental illness, treatments with various drugs known to affect brain function such as cannabis, nicotine, alcohol, and nitrous oxide.

The records kept at West Riding were so detailed and extensive that they are now recognised as being of huge historic and medical importance, and are protected by UNESCO.

The collection includes over 5000 photographs of patients from the late 1860s onwards, putting a face to thousands of the patient numbers. One patient was Mary Manning, a Bradford domestic servant, who was admitted in 1880. She claimed to be the 'Queen of heaven, possessed of great wealth and had been crowned'.

Sir Crichton- Browne reminds me of a character from the Asylum season of American Horror Story- Timothy Howard. However, his intentions were a lot different and not positive in any way."

Maybe this story is what inspired Ryan Murphy (the producer of AHS) to create the Asylum version of the show?

Pleasance, C. (2015). Portraits from an asylum: Harrowing 19th-century photos show patients at notorious institution kept in SHACKLES and visibly distressed. Available: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3000407/Portraits-asylum-Harrowing-19th-century-photos-patients-notorious-institution-kept-SHACKLES-visibly-distressed.html. Last accessed 18th Mar 2015.

Evaluation of project progression - Great Expectations ♰

Miss Havisham- Continuity 

Estella

The great expectations project was definitely something I found challenging. I have learnt a lot of new techniques such as ageing, illness as well as burns, cuts and bruises. I enjoyed every bit of this project as I feel it allowed me to really grow as an artist by requiring me to design something I have never tried designing before. I also enjoyed the research part of the project, before I did not quite understand what that era was about. I really enjoyed finding out about the characters and starting to create them in my head while watching the TV series and reading the book. I felt like there was no limitations and I could fully create what I had in mind for that specific character. If I was going to do this again, I would know how to prepare myself for the assessment better. I did not quite realise I needed continuity notes in the second part of the assessment, I just assumed I could use the same ones as well as the face chart to re-create the look. However, I do not feel that it affected the level of it and am very happy with the outcome of this assessment. The transformation part was the most enjoyable and that is when I have learnt the most- by practising. Overall, I feel like I have learned a lot by going through the designing process and am very happy with the outcome of this assignment.

Ideas for Estella ♰

- Hair Ideas -

Idea No.1

The picture on the left shows my first idea for Estella's hair. It involves a simple bun at the back with a few curls hanging out of it. The front of the hair is sleeked back with curls near the ears.

I really like this hairstyle as I feel like it represents the character and their personality. Estella is a young woman who also can be quite evil... therefore the combination of the curls and sleek bits of hair.

Idea No. 2

The picture on the right shows my second idea for Estella's hair. This hairstyle is very simple with the hair curled all over and a hair piece at the top of the head to create this 'princess' feeling that Estella is giving off as a character.

The two front bits of hair would be pinned back to symbolise her 'innocence' which sometimes she seems to have. 

Idea No. 3

This is my third idea for the hair and it is the most simple one. However I feel like Estella is not mean to stand out that much therefore this would probably be my final choice for the look. The two front bits would be sleeked and pinned at the back. There would also be a bun at the back of the head, which I want to look quite neat. 

- Make-Up -

Make Up Idea No.1

Make Up Idea No. 2

The make up idea on the left is very subtle and girly. I feel like it represents Estella very well as it is not too bold but is still quite 'sassy'. I want the skin to stay as natural looking as possible as she was stuck inside with her mother. I feel like it would represent the character in an appropriate way...  

Make up idea on the right is a lot more emphasised, especially the lips. I want the eyes to look very natural as well as the eyebrows. I want the skin to stay as natural looking again- as I feel if it was tanned, it would not go with the idea for the character and the circumstances she lived in.

Make Up Idea No. 3

This is my last idea for Estella and it is the most 'bold' one. The eyelashes are very black, which would represent evil. The cheeks would be emphasises with blusher and the lips would be fire red which would represent how unpredictable she is. I feel like that would make the make up a lot more interesting and add story to it. 

PRACTISE 

Analysis - Estella's Character ♰

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Estella's character on the screen in my opinion is very ironic, as she has been moulded into this cold-hearted person but then turns into

someone that says it has made her good in the end. Raised from the age of three by Miss Havisham who destroys her abilities to interact with the world, Estella has been made and forced to break men's hearts. She ends up making Pip (other main character in the film) fall in love with her, which not long after turns into a heart break.

Unlike the dreamy and traditional love story, Estella is cold, does't care about other people's feelings and is very manipulative. Though she makes Pip feel very small for not being a part of the upper classes, Estella is actually even lower-born than Pip; as Pip learns near the end of the novel, she is the daughter of Magwitch who was the coarse convict, which means she comes from the very lowest level of society.

Despite her cold behavior and the damaging influences in her life, Dickens nevertheless ensures that Estella is still a sympathetic character. He does it by giving the reader a sense of her inner struggle -“Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching. . . . I have been bent and broken, but—I hope—into a better shape.”

Daily Life of a Victorian Woman ♰

Because of high birth rates and improving life expectancy, Victorian families were normally quite large. The growth of residential domestic service, even low down the social scale, and the prevalence of lodgers, especially in towns, meant that many households were further swollen in size and complex in formation. Although households consisting of more than two generations or containing more than one husband/wife partnership had never been common in Britain, there was a tendency, especially in textile districts, for grandparents to live in households containing young children, particularly where mothers were working outside the home.

Many young people, especially young women, migrated to towns and cities in search of work as the possibilities of agricultural employment declined. Migration was facilitated by family and other connections: communities were recreated in towns and cities through local concentrations of settlement of particular ethnic, religious, regional or familial groups and by the possibility of finding accommodation through lodging or domestic service in the homes of contacts of this kind.

Most households necessarily drew income from a number of sources, with many women and juveniles adding to wage earning even if their employment was usually more intermittent and low-paid than that of adult males. Although the male breadwinner wage was increasingly regarded as the ideal and even the norm, in practice many households were dependent upon female earnings, especially those households run by widows.

One of the greatest problems facing the historian of women's work is the absence of reliable information. The census enumerators' books are the most obvious source, especially for the period after 1841 when occupations were included; but in practice such information is vastly more accurate for men than for women for several reasons. Firstly, contradictory and inconsistent instructions were given as to how to classify women's work, particularly where this involved home-working or consisted of helping in a family-run business (such work was sometimes deliberately excluded from the record). Furthermore, women's work was often part-time, casual, and not regarded as important enough to declare.

Sometimes it was illegal (as with prostitution) or performed in unregulated sweatshops (a further reason for failure to record). Women may have also have preferred to keep their income-earning a secret from their husband. An occupational designation, for whatever reason, meant something very different for men than for women. With the emphasis primarily upon their role as wives and mothers, women workers did not usually see their occupation as a centrally defining characteristic of their lives, and therefore frequently failed to declare it.

Hudson, Pat. 'BBC - History - Women's Work'. Bbc.co.uk. N.p., 2011. Web. 2 Mar. 2015.

Music ♰

Music sheet cover for 'The Ratcatcher's Daughter', 19th century.
Museum no. S.2768-1986, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Music halls can be traced back to the taverns and coffee houses of 18th century London where men met to eat, drink and do business. Performers sang songs whilst the audience ate, drank and joined in the singing. By the 1830s taverns had rooms devoted to musical clubs. They presented Saturday evening Singsongs and Free and Easies. These became so popular that entertainment was put on two or three times a week.

For more middle-class clientele song and supper rooms opened in the 1830s. They served hot food and provided entertainment until the early hours of the morning. Rooms like The Coal Hole, off the Strand in London soon developed a scurrilous reputation. At Evans’ Song and Supper Rooms in Covent Garden singers were paid £1 a week and free drink. The star of Evans' Song was Sam Cowell who was most famous for his song, 'The Rat Catcher’s Daughter'. It was so popular that fellow performer Charles Sloman, who was famous for improvising lines off the top of his head, wrote an extra two verses. Sam Cowell was brought up in America but came to Britain in 1840 where he worked as an actor in Scotland and then London. After a few years of hard graft in the theatre, Cowell began to move into comedy character songs fashionable in the music halls. He was best known for his cockney songs such as 'Villikins and his Dinah' and 'Billy Barlow', but he also burlesqued serious dramas including a version of 'Hamlet' in doggerel. While enjoying considerable popularity in Britain, Sam accepted an invitation to do a tour in America which turned out to be a disaster. Poverty, a harsh winter, and alcohol destroyed his health and he died young, as did many performers of his generation who drank. He was only 45.

The taverns, saloons and supper rooms would have been noisy and difficult places in which to perform. The audiences chatted throughout the acts and could be very unruly often throwing things at the performers – bottles, old boots, even a dead cat. Industrial towns favoured hurling iron rivets. In some halls, bottles carried by the waiters were chained to the trays and the orchestra was protected from the missiles by steel grilles stretched over the pit.

While women were not allowed in the middle-class song and supper rooms, working-class women went to the taverns. In the early days they would often accompany their husbands and bring along their children and even babies. Charles Dickens declared in disgust that the pit had became ‘a virtual nursery’.

The Green Gate Tavern, print, 1854. ©
Victoria and Albert Museum, London

The Green Gate Tavern on London's City Road was a sort of Victorian pub theatre. Many public houses put on entertainment of one sort or another, usually involving music and comedy.

This image from 1854 shows a scene from a play called Paul Pry by John Poole. The play's central character was an idle, meddlesome anti-hero. Not many of the audience seem to be at all interested in what is happening on stage. Just opposite the Green Gate, a rival pub was the Eagle, one of the most famous early music halls which was doing a roaring trade by 1854.

Vam.ac.uk,. 'The Story Of Music Hall - Victoria And Albert Museum'. N.p., 2015. Web. 2 Mar. 2015.

Continuity in the TV and Film industry ♰

The picture on the left shows an example of a continuity sheet that is very important while trying to re-create a look. It helps you to remember all the necessary products needed to create the look which you have to do several times while being on the set. Continuity is very visible on the screen as everything is x10 bigger so you have to make sure every detail stays the same as it WILL be visible.

"Continuity in the makeup department is specific to keeping the look of the actor in the scene consistent when it is shot over several days. As the makeup artist, it is your job to provide the EXACT same look every time that scene is shot regardless of the day, time, location or conditions when you are working with that specific actor."

source: 

https://suzettemariel.wordpress.com/2011/05/26/how-makeup-continuity-on-set-can-help-your-beauty-workflow/

Why do I think continuity is important ?

I think continuity is a very important element when it comes to both- TV and Film. Certain looks give you an idea of a character and represent a lot about them- who they are, how old they are, what their situation is as well as many other important things. Changing that and breaking the idea of continuity would also break that chain of the audience believing in the character and seeing what it is suppose to be seen as. 

Continuity Errors ...

Continuity error is when there is no consistency in a film.  

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This screenshot is from a famous film Pretty Woman and shows lack of continuity as the food changes from a croissant to a pancake in the next shot. 

The photo below shows a shot from American Pie in which we can see that the cup held by the girl changed from blue to clear.

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The photo below shows a screenshot form Twilight and a very visible mistake that was so easy to avoid! Bella's hair in the first photo is out of the hood and in the second one, it is inside the hood. 

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All these continuity errors could have been avoided so easily if notes had been taken correctly. Big productions like this lose reliabilty in the audience eyes in my opinion as it shows their professionalism levels are not that high. If that much money is being spent on a film, surely they can hire someone to make sure things like this do not happen... right?