Ever hear of painted knees? Nope? Me neither. Evidently it was quite the fashion accessory for flappers back in '25. Reminds me of the body painting of the sixties. I guess the flappers were the original mod girls.
The following headline and blurb accompanied this cute photo of Anna May, which appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle on August 1, 1925:
Painted Monkey Graces Knee of Almond-Eyed Film Star
Anna May Wong, Chinese screen actress, who has adopted the fad of having her knees painted. The much-discussed evolution monkey adorns Anna May's limbs.
Pretty cool, huh! However, I'm of the opinion that it's not Scopes' monkey who's climbing Anna May's calf — but mischievous Sun Wukong, the Monkey King!
6 comments:
Hah, hah. I've never heard of that, either. Those crazy flappers!
By chance, I have a quasi-related post prepped for later today.
The more things change...
Newspapers then seemed to have a lot of pin-up type photos including the "almond-eyed film star" of course. I imagine the reference to the evolution monkey was to give them a rationale to run a cheesecake shot.
I was thinking of Dennis's post on a fad for removable tatoos, some quite intricate looking, that a lot of young Chinese entertainers are getting.
Which reminded me of a great neighborhood in Queens (NYC), Little Guyana. Its a great place for "fusion" type food--Indo-Caribbean, Guyana-Chinese. There are almost as many places where one can get tatoo-like henna skin art as there are restaurants.
-- Dennis, after seeing all those stars with their temporary Chanel jewelry tattoos, it makes me wonder if the "CC" stands for copycat. They can't touch the coolness of Anna May and her monkey!
-- Ed, if I've learned one thing from browsing old newspapers it's that nothing ever really changes.
Little Guyana sounds like a fun place. I'd love to try some of that fusion food!
how progressive for that time! she was such a rebel.
CC = Credit Card! :D
-- Ling, yep Anna May was a true trailblazer!
-- Dennis, thanks for clearing that up... LOL!
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