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Wearable Art by Shirley Cunningham
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While shopping the many stores devoted exclusively to color and plastic, walking row after row in search of just the toy to brighten my young grandson's eyes; a realization began to spread over me. What a difference, the choice and the abundance, the automation and the glitz, from my memory of the
toys of my childhood.
I spent my childhood under the canopy of World War II. "Store bought toys", if available, were a luxury. There was, of course, my baby doll that sat under the tree each Christmas morning from 1942 to 1945, dressed each year in new clothes made by my Grandmother. There were coloring books, pick
-up sticks, jacks and roller skates. As we got older, the hours of hot Texas summer afternoons and rainy days would be spent playing cards. The game of choice was "spoons", but Rook and Flinch had its share of the hours, as well. But, of the toys, the most fun for me was a new book of paper dolls. Shirley Temple, my name sake was, of course, always a favorite; but a purchased set of paper dolls was a very special occurrence . I don't remember it happening very often. What I do remember were the wonderful substitutes, the pattern books my mother brought me, discarded periodically by the
fabric departments of two of Waco's finest stores , Goldstein - Migels and Cox's. One time it might be a Vogue pattern book, the next time, Mc Calls. I would spend hours selecting just the beautiful ladies I wanted. I would carefully cut them out until I had a shoe box full of my own haute paper dolls. I don't remember playing with them. I just remember the thrill of selecting and cutting. I still love to cut.
Thirty years later in a book store, I saw a paper doll collection of designs by the marvelously gifted fashion artist/ illustrator, Erte'. I could not resist purchasing both volumes. I placed the volumes on the
book shelf in my studio. When I would hit a creative dry spell, I would take them down and once again enter that special world of fashion fantasy. One day while shopping a vintage clothing store in Austin, I found a 1915 silk velvet, hand -embroidered and beaded evening dress . It was in pieces, but
the pieces looked as if each was a section of a design out of one of these books. I could not wait to
get home and begin this painting. On the way home I named the painting to be, ERTE'.
As I chose and cut the various fabrics for ERTE', a familiar joy came over me, the joy of paper dolls .
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