Outtakes: When fleas were at the forefront of fashion. Plus paintings by an extraordinary Joe
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Your support makes all the difference.Oh, for the good old days before television, when people made their own entertainment! These puglas vestides (dressed fleas, to you), in the Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum in Tring, Hertfordshire, date from 1905, and are the work of a Mexican woman, who set her many children to catch them for her from cats and dogs, then sat up late at night stitching for them. Mexican dressed fleas were sold as curiosities and may have originally been made in convents, since nuns excelled in making miniatures. Small is beautiful!
Art take The apocalyptic visions of painter Joe Coleman have a cult following in America. Far left: Coleman's portrait of Ed Gein, the Wisconsin serial killer, and the inspiration for The Silence of the Lambs. Coleman peers meekly out at the world, while behind him are depicted scenes from his childhood, scenes of atrocities. scenes from the graveyard. Left: in Mommy/Daddy, Coleman's parents - his aggressive, alcoholic father, his softer, sadder mother - are shown as two halves, joined. Both died of cancer. Their diseased organs appear on their bodies. See more of the artist's challenging and disturbing work at the Chamber of Pop Culture, London WC1, until 30 May.
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