PERFUME BOTTLES, AUTOCHROME, LUMIERE BROS, BURLINGTON

How do vintage perfume bottles lead to an historic Lumiere Brothers factory in Burlington Vermont? Follow me.

Vintage perfume bottle, photo © Liza Cowan 2010.

Yesterday I stopped by to chat with my friend Mary Heinrich Aloi at her wonderful antique store, Vintage Inspired Antiques/Whistle Stop Antiques, on Flynn Avenue  in Burlington. I went to discuss business but I cant help looking around her packed- to- the- gills shop whenever I stop by. I spied some antique vintage perfume bottles. Not only were they beautiful, but I'm kind of a perfume nut. 

 
I bought a few bottles and carried them back to my store, not to sell but to photograph, and to delight in the lingering scent of Bandit by the infamous perfumer Germaine Cellier, and whatever delightful aromas might be waiting in the other bottles.

In addition to Bandit I found Tabu, Geoffrey Beene and the alluring Private Collection 1973 by Estee Lauder.

 

 

 I set up the bottles in many different configurations, with the sunlight changing as I went. The next one, along with the one at the top, are my favorites. The bottles have a strange sensuality, evoking not just their scent, but a presence bestowed by the  somewhat anthropomorpic shape of the glass itself.

Two Perfume Bottles,Estee Lauder Private Collection and unknown, photo @Liza Cowan 2010.Available online at small equals store

These photographs reminded me of the work of a photo secessionist artist, but I couldn't remember who, so I went on a little cyber hunt to see what might be lurking in the back of my visual memory.

 

Heinrich Kuhn, Still Life with Glasses, 1914, Brown pigment

 

Heinrich Kuhn, Austrian photographer. 1866-1944. Worked initially with the multi-gum bichromate process, and  platinum and oil transfer prints, In 1907 he met up with Alfred Stieglitz and Edward Steichen, and they began experimenting with the new process developed by the Lumiere Bros, the Autochrome.

Here's a Kuhn Autochrome.

Heinrich Kühn, Miss Mary and Edeltrude at the Hill Crest, ca. 1910, autochrome 

How does this lead to Burlington Vermont? It's a little known fact that the Lumiere Bros. set up a factory to make autochrome plates in Burlington Vermont. The factory was here in Burlington for about ten years, starting around 1902. And where was the plant? In the very building,  or at least on the very spot - because the original factory building burned down - on Flynn Avenue where I bought my perfume bottles at Vintage Inspired Antiques/Whistle Stop Antiques.

Want to know more ? Use these links to get you started.

Germaine Cellier from the blog Perfume Shrine

Bandit from the blog Perfume Shrine

Heinrich Kuhn and Lumiere from the blog The Blue Lantern

Heinrich Kuhn, Lumiere, Steichen, Steiglitz from the blog Venetian Red

more about Kuhn from the  blog The Blue Lantern

autochrome article from NPR

Vintage Inspired Antiques

Vintage Inspired Etsy shop

Lumiere in Burlington from Photo-Era Magazine 1907

about Autochrome from Rhode Island Historical Society

 

 

 

SUPPORT LESBIAN ART: THE BUTTON

                    support Lesbian Art  button by Liza Cowan, White Mare Inc. circa 1984

This button has kind of gone viral, which really surprises me. I created this little thing in about 1984. I had a small button and graphics company called White Mare, Inc. I published greeting cards, postcards and buttons, mainly on a Lesbian theme, but not exclusively. Unlike most of my stock, which I had commercially manufactured, I made this one on my own button machines. Mind you, I had a rather sophisticated button machine, which I'd haul around to festivals and street fairs making photo buttons. I wrote about that here

Anyway, I was linking around the web this morning, browsing my usual haunts. I clicked an interesting link on one of my favorites, Design Observer, and it led me to a blog I'd never seen called intelligent clashing. Nice blog,  by the way. So I was scrolling around it it and HELOO! here's my button.

Now, by serindipity or design, I had just last night been over at the website Outhistory.com at the exhibit site for Lesbian Buttons from The Lesbian Herstory Archives where  found several of my buttons - without attribution by the way. The support Lesbian art button is the only one of mine that doesn't have publishing information around the rim of the button. Technically that's called the curl, but you don't have to know that to find the copyright infromation clearly printed. I don't understand how an archive can post something without attribution, but that's another story. Needless to say, I commented right away and added my information,

So, back to this morning. On the site Intelligent Clashing, I click on my button and it links to another site Nothing is new. where they've posted a bunch of the buttons from the Outhistory and Lesbian  Herstory Archive site. Again without attribution but with links to OutHistory and the Lesbian Herstory Archive. Now, I understand why Nothing is new didn't add attribution. They didn't know it, because the archive didn't supply any.

So...I don't know if the button has shown up anywhere else, but I thought I'd better claim it here. At home.

Buttons by Liza Cowan, White Mare Inc. Direct photo image on Mita 900-D copier circa 1978

I've written about my buttons before. see post HERE

Update: through the miracle that is the world wid web, Nothing Is New has updated their site to include the publishing information. And it only took about 15 minutes of leaving comments on the site and connecting through twitter. Good Gawd, what did we do before the internet?