Product Details

In 1884 a remarkable twelve-year-old girl made a paper doll s house. While these were fashionable enough at the time they were usually drawn and painted. Miss Sarah Elizabeth Birdsall Otis however chose the medium of collage: scraps of wallpaper gilded trim colored-in cut-outs of furniture and engravings from mail-order catalogs all glued down unselfconsciously in book form with no regard for scale or realism. What makes the album so special is its creator s stunning innate artistry. She also populated her house with paper dolls their delightful cut-out costumes preserved in envelopes marked with the names of the characters and their accessories stored in paper squares marked Hats and Bonnets or Umbrellas and Parasols. Eric Boman s photographs capture Miss Otis s vivid fantasy world in all its quirky splendor. Exploring the household from the conservatory parlor and library to the dining room and bedrooms the images portray a domain of astonishing color and aesthetic daring. Context is