My new book is coming out on October 10th. It’s called London Mirabilia: Journey Through A Rare Enchantment.
Published by Logos Edizioni, and graced once again by Carlo Vannini‘s wonderful photographs, the book is the second entry in the Mirabilia Collection, a series of alternative guides to the most famous tourist destinations, especially designed for the explorers of the unusual.
This time Carlo and I ventured into the very heart of London, in search for the weirdest and most amazing locations to share with our readers.
From the press kit:
We must not be deceived by the cliché of a perpetually gloomy sky, or by the threat of Victorian prudery, nor restrict ourselves to seeing the plain and classical architecture of London as an expression of Anglo-Saxon severity. Much more than other large cities, London is a boundless multitude living on contrasts.
It is only here – maybe as a reaction to the innate, restrained behaviour of Londoners – that the non-conformism of dandies, the incorrectness without taboos of British humour, Blake’s ecstatic explosions and punk nihilism could bloom. It is only here that the most futuristic buildings shamelessly rise up alongside row houses or ancient churches. And it is only here that you can gaze at a sunset over a chaotic railway station, and feel you are “in paradise”, as the Kinks sing in Waterloo Sunset, perhaps the most beautiful song ever dedicated to the city.
LONDON MIRABILIA is an invitation to dive into the unexpected colours, the contradictions and the less known splendours of the city.
17 eccentric and refined locations await the reader who – accompanied by the texts of Ivan Cenzi, the explorer of the bizarre, and the evocative pictures by Carlo Vannini – is given the opportunity to visit the most hidden museums of London, admiring in turn the refinement of ancient historiated fans or the terrible grandeur of the war machines which conquered the sky and the sea.
We will sip the inevitable pint of real ale in a traditional London pub where the macabre remains of an extraordinary story are preserved; we will discover sumptuous houses decorated with arabesques hiding behind ordinary façades, and fluorescent collections of neon signs; we will wander among the gravestones swallowed by greenery through romantic English graveyards; we will walk through the door of fairy-tale interiors and of real modern wunderkammers.
The second edition of the Bizzarro Bazar Contest is over.
In writing this, I realized I don’t know a way to express my gratitude to all candidates that’s not boring. So just take it for granted that you’ve warmed the heart of an old seeker of oddities.
Let’s not beat around the bush, you’re here to see what the deliciously deviant minds of your fellow readers have come up with.
Like last year, the entries were so many, and of such high quality, that they made it awfully hard for me to select just three winners.
So the warning stays the same: what you’re about to see are the honorable mentions — at the incpontestable discretion of the Jury, that is me — but a round of applause should go to all those who don’t appear in this limited space. Over the next few weeks I shall find a way to make it even by sharing on social media all the submitted works, along with the info about the authors.
So, let’s kick off our weird parade!
Many classic elements — the hourglass, the withered flower, the skull, the burned-out candle — for this rather gothic version of the vanitas.
If you want to split hair, that plainly pasted logo in Giulia’s works does not fully comply with the contest rules; but hey, we’re among friends, and her collages entitled Under The Skin are so beautiful that I just couldn’t leave them out.
Gaber Ricci sumbitted an anatomical animated GIF, which would be perfect for a T-shirt. All we need now is some tech guy to figure out how to play GIFs on T-shirts, and we’ve got a business that’ll shake the world.
(Gaber shies away from social media, but he runs a highly intelligent blog in Italian: Suprasaturalanx.)
The LondoNerD is another great blogger, and for the occasion he drew a portrait of me as Jeremy Bentham‘s famous auto-icon. Apart from the fact that my head too is often somewhere else, the juxtaposition with the great philosopher is undeserved.
I doubt this will ever go viral, but the way has been opened: here’s the first meme dedicated to this blog. (Text says: Your expression when a new Bizzarro Bazar post is up.)
Elena Nisi went as far as to turn me into a comic book hero. And the detail that made my day was the allusion to my friend and BDSM expert Ayzad, whom I can only picture as the villain here: I’d give anything to read the issue in which I finally confront his deadly whips! FSHH! THUD! KA-BOOM!
This photo perfectly describes what happens when the deadline for submitting a new book to my editor is approaching.
I’ll leave it to Mala Tempora to explain his submission, created in collaboration with Viktoria Kiss:
We imagined a hypothetical article on Bizzarro Bazar regarding the Icelandic folkloric monster called Tilberi[a little monster witches can summon to steal milk from sheep, cows and occasionally human mothers – Ed.], and we created two objects to illustrate the story. In this case the collaboration with Viktoria was priceless, as these beings could only be summoned by women.
Blue Luna blends clear references to the Capuchin Crypt in Rome (see my book Mors Pretiosa), wunderkammer’s naturalia, and a skeleton with an all-too-familiar goatee.
The amazing Emanuela Cucchiarini a.k.a. Eeriette, who won the second prize last year, created this unbelievable gouache on crayons, inspired by the jewel-covered relics of martyrs and saints.
This work deserves, I think, a honorable mention.
Meewelyne’s illustration may be deceivingly simple. But carefully look at it, and a sense of uneasiness will start to creep up.
A little girl is walking hand in hand with her mother towards what looks like a circus or a fairground; the strokes are gracious and quite reminiscent of Beatrix Potter‘s illustrations. Yet, in the most calssic Freudian declination of the uncanny, some details seem to be out of place, ambiguous and confusing: the mother wears a fox’s head pinned to her waist, and the child’s backpack is made of a bear cub’s skin and bird wings (look at those robins!). Who are they? Why are they so comfortable with taxidermy? Is it a family business, does the mother teach her daughter how to skin and tan animals? Or should we infer that, in this imaginary universe, it’s OK to dress up like that?
This image — despite its delicate line drawing, straight out of a children’s book — is hiding an unsettling vein which I really loved.
After days of indecision, I decided to opt for a joint third place.
3rd Prize
Another astounding nude self-portrait, but this time quite ironic and wild-eyed.
Chiara Toniolo’s work is deliciously loony, and it seduced me for the enthusiastic, smiling and bright way in which it presents elements that, in theory, should be upsetting.
And let’s face it. There’s the artistic nude, the skull, the kitten: that spells boost in page views.
This year’s surprise was the unexpected participation of mentalist Francesco Busani (a couple of years ago I posted a special feature about him). Being a great collection of ouija boards, Francesco created one especially for Bizzarro Bazar. The philologic attention to details is astounding, from vintage artworks to the use of the original materials (namely masonite) that were employed in the Sixties to build these psychic instruments.
Francesco created only two copies of this board: one stays in his collection, and one is already a part of mine. But I must confess I still haven’t tried to consult it, because if there’s one thing I learned from horror movies is that you don’t fiddle with some things.
The wonderful Gadiro (Gaia Di Roberto) crafts dolls, plush toys, accessories, pendants and necklaces that are both creepy and kawaii. In order for this mixture to be fresh and original, you need a lot of talent but above all a unique sensibility.
A sensibility that also appears from her words:
The existence of Bizzarro Bazar not only inspired me for my work but it urged me to take this strange path of the “sweet little creepy creatures maker”; in times when I almost felt guilty about nurturing certain interests, this blog and all the people who follow it made me feel less alone, I would say in family.
Looking at myself as a puppet among Gadiro’s dolls, I now feel part of a family, too.
A decorated skull?
But what about that kind of microscope slide on the side of the door?
Now I get it!
It’s not a skull, it’s a… Bizzarroscope!
Taking inspiration from one of my very first articles, in which I talked about the extraordinary stenoscopic cameras of Wayne Martin Belger, André Santapaola a.k.a. Elragno built this spectacular instrument which has the purpose of injecting wonder into our worldview.
Thanks to a stenopeic hole in the skull’s right eye socket it is possible to fix reality through the artifice of photography (it’s not by chance the relative viewfinder is labeled Artificialia); by inserting the slide on the left side of the skull, one can watch the world throught the filter of a butterfly wing, a dewdrop, or any other natural element — and that’s why this lens is called Naturalia.
The label on the forehead reminds us of the third classic element of any wunderkammer, as well as the inevitable result of these explorations: Mirabilia, “marvels” and “awe”.
Thus Elragno wins the 1st prize with a particurlarly well-crafted object, but above all for its very sophisticated concept: “the Bizzarroscope […], just like Ivan Cenzi’s writings, allowes us to see the world from a different perspective, in which the “observed” becomes a means for observation.”
It’s like saying: the passion for the unusual spurs from the desire to change one’s own way of looking, and Wonder is the key to discover new, unexpected horizons.
If you particularly liked some of these works, make sure you show the authors your appreciation in the comments!
Over the next few weeks I will be sharing on social media all the submitted works which do not appear here.
Once again, thanks to all contestants, you cheered me up and moved me — and I hope you had fun.
The Korowai people are the perfect tribe, because they are uncontaminated.
The first contact dates back to 1974, when about thirty natives where accosted by a team of anthropologists; it is assumed that until then the Korowai people were unaware of the existence of other populations beyond themselves. A few years later, the missionaries arrived to try and convert them.
The Korowai people are the perfect tribe, because they live in an exotic way.
Hidden in a forest’s corner in one of the most secluded countries—the isle of New Guinea—they build stilt houses on top of the trees. In this way they protect against insects, snakes, boars and enemies from other tribes. Over the years, their engineering skills have been shown in several documentaries: in 2011 an episode of Human Planet, produced by the BBC, detailed the construction of a house at the vertiginous height of 40 metres above the ground, and the move of a family to this new incredible dwelling.
The Korowai people are the perfect tribe, because they are cannibals.
They do not eat their enemies nor are into indiscriminate endocannibalism: they kill and devour only those who practice black magic.
When these people get an unknown disease, before dying they usually mention the name of the khakhua, the male witch who cast the curse on them. Then the relatives of the dead person capture the necromancer and chop him into pieces, distributing his meat among the village families.
In 2006 Paul Raffaele, an Australian adventure reporter and television personality, went among the Korowai people to save a little boy who was about to be cannibalized. The episode of 60 Minutes in which he recounted his expedition was watched by an extremely large audience. The intrepid reporter also wrote a report entitled “Sleeping With The Cannibals” for the prestigious Smithsonian Magazine; this article remains very popular to this day.
The Korowai people are the perfect tribe, because we still need the myth of the Savage.
We like to think that “out of time” tribes exist, crystallized in a prehistoric phase without experiencing any evolution or social transformation. This fable reassures us about our superiority, about our extraordinary capacity for progress. This is why we prefer the Savage to be naked, primitive, rude, or even animal-like, namely characterized by all those features we have abandoned.
Let us take the example of the tsantsa, the famous shrunken heads of the indios Shuar – Jibaros settled between Ecuador and Peru: before the arrival of white men, the natives sporadically produced very few of them. But Western explorers saw the tsantsa as the perfect macabre souvenir, and above all the emblem of the “primitive barbarity” of these tribes. It was only because of the growing demand for these artefacts that the Shuar and Achuar tribes started to organize raids among the neighbouring populations in order to stock up new heads, to shrunken and sell to white man in exchange for rifles.
When visiting museums of anthropology, only a few people realize that sometimes they are not at all looking at the artefacts from an ancient and faraway culture: they are admiring a fantasy, the idea of that culture created and built by Western people for themselves.
And what about the Korowai people, who live perched on trees like Tarzan?
In April this year, the BBC admitted that the house in the tree 40 metres above the ground, shown in the 2011 episode of Human Planet, was a fake.
Namely it was a sequence agreed upon with the natives, who were charged by the television crew of building a giant stilt house—which normally they wouldn’t have normally ever built. A member of the tribe declared that the house had been built “for the benefit of the producers of television shows overseas”: the traditional Korowai dwellings actually reached a maximum height of 5-10 metres above the ground.
And the feasts with human meat?
Cannibalism as well hasn’t actually been practiced for countless decades. “Most of these groups have a ten-year experience in providing these stories [of cannibalism] to tourists” declared anthropologist Chris Ballard of the Australian National University.
Their life now depends on Western people driven to the jungle by their search for strong emotions. The Korowai people have learnt to give them what they want.
And if white people still need the Savage, here they are.
