| 28 Apr 13 Brass anklets for slaves and wives |
| Solid brass anklets appear in several different
places in the Odalisquian world, and still appear in
modern day slavery in parts of Africa. I've pulled
together some of these appearances, not least
because anklets are so popular as symbols of
ownership in O&P and M/s relationships. [more...]
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| 26 Apr 13 Turkish Delight |
 No harem room is complete without a bowl of Turkish delight at hand and a slave to keep it refilled. I've loved the stuff since a girlfriend brought me some back from Istanbul years ago. Now I have this brass bowl from Turkey in my own Hareem and always have a box or two in a draw of the sideboard. [more...]
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| 8 Apr 13 Francesc Masriera and Maria Fortuny |
I've blogged about mia and I going to Barcelona last
weekend, and as I mentioned, one of the paintings we saw in the
National Museum of Catalan Art (MNAC) was
Masriera's "In the presence of the master" from 1891. I
originally thought it might depict an ancient Egyptian
subject, but I now see it as orientalist by comparing
it with some of Masriera's other work. Maria Fortuny's
"Odalisque" is usually also in the same gallery in
Barcelona so I'll mention it too. [more...]
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| 24 Mar 13 Six more paintings |
 Today I uploaded six more Orientalist paintings, showing domestic scenes and odalisques and slaves interacting with men who are reading or writing. [more...]
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| 14 Jan 13 "Harem" by Colin Falconer |
| Colin Falconer's novel Harem (or "The Sultan's Harem") was a free Kindle download over Christmas so I had a look. Falconer is a bestselling author of historical fiction, which is a genre I don't often read, but I was pleasantly surprised. [more...]
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| 10 Dec 12 The Octagram |
| One of my aims in posting all the paintings, encouraging other people to post ones like they too, and creating this group was to find useful ideas in amongst all this deeply attractive material. Useful in terms of real-life D/s-M/s-O&P relationships. On the Odalisques.com site is the Octagram - an eight-point distillation of key themes from this Odalisquian world which embodies this aim. [more...]
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| 10 Nov 12 Furnishing the Hareem |
For a long time one of the rooms in my house was the Studio, and it was used for a few photoshoots and scenes. This autumn I've been refurnishing it as the Hareem, with an eastern theme (although I'm leaving the suspension points intact!) The photo shows the divan sofa I've built in one corner, along with some of the accessories. [more...]
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| 9 Nov 12 New odalisques.com site |
I've been posting the Orientalist images of harems etc to my personal blog site (www.tanos.org.uk) recently, plus some blog posts about topics like Leighton House. I've now set up www.odalisques.com as a dedicated blogs/pictures site for those posts and pictures. I've also posted some of pieces of text about harems etc (eg from Edward Lane's "Modern Egyptians") and it links to the Pinterest, Twitter, Tumblr etc profiles that automagically receive the same content. If you like these kinds of paintings and topics, it will be worth looking at  [more...]
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| 22 Oct 12 Visit to Leighton House, London |
This weekend we had a trip to London, and on the Sunday visited the house of Lord Leighton, a 19th century painter of historical and orientalist subjects. He painted both pretty girls (such as the "The light of the harem") and well-researched scenes from other times and places. He travelled widely throughout his long career and Leighton House features a magnificent Arab Hall, decorated with reclaimed tiles bought on a journey to Damascus and woodwork from Cairo. It's somewhere I've been meaning to visit for years and I'm really glad it has coincided with my sudden return to orientalism. [more...]
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| 15 Oct 12 Making a falaka stick for bastinado |
In many eastern cultures, beating the soles of the feet, or bastinado, was the dominant form of corporal punishment for wrongdoers, including wives and servants. It was especially prevelant in the Ottoman Empire centred on Turkey and in Egypt, which inspired so much of the western fantasy "Odalisquian" world of harems, odalisques, slavegirls etc. Bastinado was done using some kind of rod or cane and a stick with a rope to hold the ankles, called a falaka. This blog shows a falaka stick I made this week. [more...]
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mia carrying water at Bridgewood
mia digging in chains at Bridgewood
Modern day slaves of the Tuaregs in Niger
Indian anklets
Brass manillas on the desk in my Study
