Scallop

Scallop (pronounced skol-uhp or skal-uhp)

(1) Any of the various marine bivalve mollusks of the superfamily Pectinoidea (genus Argopecten (Pecten)) and related genera (attached to a substratum (genus Chlamys)), distinguished by moving in water by rapidly clapping together their pair of fluted shell valves.  “Scallop” is used of other molluscs (including certain clams and oysters) and for commercial purposes, all (in the broad) are classed with the “saltwater shellfish”.

(2) The edible adductor muscle of certain species of such mollusks, widely used in cooking (in some places sold as “sea scallops” to distinguish use of “scallop” from other dishes (made usually with thinly sliced meat)).

(3) Either of the shell valves of such a mollusk, usually having radial ribs and a wavy outer edge (often used decoratively).

(4) A scallop shell re-purposed as a receptacle in which food (usually seafood) is served (and often baked).

(5) In cooking, a thin slice of meat, either so cut or something thicker “flattened” by pounding with a “meat tenderizer”, mallet or similar implement.

(6) Any of a series of curved projections (classically as multiple, symmetrical crescents) cut along the edge, used in sewing, knitting & crochet of necklines and other hems and in gardening, carpentry, art, engineering and architecture, of such shapes, used variously.

(7) In historic use (most associated with the middle & late medieval period), the badge of pilgrim (in the shape of a scallop shell).

(8) In certain places, potato (variously prepared) fried in batter.

(9) In design or construction, to finish (an edge) with scallops.

(10) In cooking, to escallop.

(11) To dredge for scallops to harvest (practiced by a scalloper).

1350-1400: From the Middle English scallop & scallop (edible bivalve mollusk), an aphetic variant of the Old French escalope (shell (of a nut); carapace), a variant of eschalope (probably from the Proto-Germanic skaljô (shell, husk, or scale), perhaps connected with the Old Norse skalpr (sheath) and the Middle Dutch schelpe (shell), from the primitive Indo-European root skel- (to cut; to split)).  English picked up the sense “thin slice of meat” from an association with French use in this context.  The process of aphesis (in linguistics & phonetics the loss of the initial unstressed vowel of a word) would have been gradual (and regionally differentiated) but, over time, the initial “e-“ vanished, “escalope” becoming “scallop”.  The use generally of shapes (clothing, architecture, garden beds) began to appear in documents in the seventeenth century although the shell (especially the larger and more colourful) clearly had for centuries been used domestically (they were nature’s pre-made serving dish) and contents (not always seafood) often were baked “in the shell”, cookbooks dated as early as 1737 detailing the methods, extending the term to describing the “decorative scalloping” used at the edges of the pastry atop pies and slices.  Before that use, “escallop” (in the sense both of “scallop shell” and “edge or border (of fabric) cut in the shape of scallops” had appeared in the late fifteenth century with the verb escalloped (having the border or edge cut out in scallops) appearing at much the same time.  The now less common alternative spelling was scallop (still seen in the UK) and the adjectival forms scallopesque, scallopish & scalloplike are non-standard.  Scallop is a noun & verb, scalloper is a noun, scalloping is a noun & verb, scalloped is a verb & adjective and scallopwise is an adverb; the noun plural is scallops.

Australian culture: The potato scallop (or “cake” or “fritter”).

In the barbarian nation of Australia, the potato scallop is a prized delicacy but while the methods of preparation and final appearance vary little from coast-to-coast, the warring tribes cannot agree on the name.  Unfortunately, use doesn’t precisely align with the state & territory boundaries but, as a general principle, it’s (1) Potato Scallop (New South Wales, Australian Capital Territory), Queensland and Western Australia, (2) Potato Cake (Victoria, Tasmania and most of the Northern Territory or (3) Potato Fritter (South Australia).  The use of “cake” and “fritter” is based on the use of those words for other dishes of a similar shape while the consensus among the “scallop faction” seems to be the name as an allusion to the “thin slice” rather than the shellfish definition and that does make sense because a potato scallop is several times the size of a typical scallop and thus dimensionally closer to the meat concoction.  Historians of food attribute the regional difference in terminology to the various terms been imported from England (where the spelling scallop was also used, the spelling influenced by certain regional pronunciations), sometime during colonial or post-colonial settlement of the continent, all the forms appearing in the British Isles at some time (although “smack” & “fairy chip” either never made the trip or didn’t survive).  In the UK, also documented is the use to describe a sautéed potato (a shallow-fried round potato slice).

Scalloped potatoes: These are different from a “potato scallop” in being thinly sliced potatoes, baked in a dish with a cheesy sauce; it's a winter favorite.

Whatever the nomenclature, the potato scallop is a classic example of “fast food” because it contains the elements (fat, salt, sugar) humans, their relatives and ancestors for millions of years stalked savannahs or jungles to hunt and harvest.  In developed nations, such substances are of course now available 24/7 “off the shelf” and a slice of potato dipped in batter and deep-fried until a golden-brown is not recommended by dieticians for frequent consumption but, for purposes of record, a “perfect scallop” is crisp on the outside with a fluffy interior the consistency of mashed potato.  The reliable Australian Food Timeline notes the long presence of this delicacy, including one recipe published in a Queensland newspaper in 1905: “Boil two pounds of potatoes, dry well, and pound in a mortar, adding three ounces of butter, half-a-gill of cream or melted butter sauce, and seasoning of pepper, salt and nutmeg. When quite smooth, butter some scallop shells, put in a teaspoonful of mixture, brush over with egg, and bake till brown; serve with watercress.”  Whether the side-dish of watercress would much mollify the dieticians is dubious but customers seem unconcerned, the item to this day a fixture on the menu-boards of fast food outlets and one that has withstood the onslaught of Burger King (Hungry Jacks in Australia), McDonalds, sushi, falafels and other international invaders.  While there may sometimes be differences in the products, these are as likely to happen within as between the regional factions.  For those who which to get a flavor of Australian culture, there’s a Potato Cake Appreciation Society run out of “cake stronghold” Victoria.

Saint James scallop shell necklaces.

The scallop shell was a symbol of Saint James the Great, worn or carried by pilgrims who had travelled to his shrine in Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, Spain, where his remains are believed to lie.  James the Great was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus and, in the New Testament, it’s asserted that when beheaded, (circa 44 AD), he was the second apostle to die (after the notorious Judas Iscariot) and the first to be martyred, pilgrims adopting the scallop shell because of its connection to maritime legends surrounding the saint's remains and its abundance along the Galician coast.  The concave shape also made them a practical thing to have during pilgrimages (handy utensils and cups) and scallops came often to be carved into baptistries or on baptismal fonts with shells (now not always genuine) used by priests to pour holy water on a child, initiating a new soul on a pilgrimage toward heaven.  According to legend, after James was martyred, his decapitated body was cast adrift in an unattended, rudderless boat, guided by angels to Iria Flavia in Hispania, where, on a shoreline covered with scallop shells, a large rock closed around his body.  There are variants of the tale but that’s the most popular.  Symbolically, the shell’s distinct lines (radiating outward) were said to represent the many different roads and paths across Europe converging on the single sacred destination at Santiago de Compostela.  The other practical value in the object was as a “proof of pilgrimage”, pilgrims gathering the shells from the sands at Cape Finisterre as tangible evidence they had completed the journey to the saint's shrine.

The logo of the Roman Catholic parish of Mary, Queen of Martyrs in Carver, Massachusetts was built with a central scallop, the crosses representing the three churches (Our Lady of Lourdes, Saint Kateri Tekakwitha & Saint Peter).  The parish provides an explanation of the scallop’s place in Christian iconography, noting the role as a “guide for pilgrims” (it takes an imaginative leap) on the path to their destination and the symbolic value of “authentication of completion of task”.  Historically, for pilgrims in the medieval era, the journey often was undertaken to fulfil a penance given by a priest and to verify compliance there was no other way but to make the trek and then collect a souvenir to show at mass so the priest world “tick the dutiful penitent off the list”.  However, commerce rose to the occasion and by the twelfth century traders had identified a lucrative market, selling shells from what would now be called “pop-up” stalls near cathedrals and churches.  It was from the tradition of Saint James the Great that the scallop came to be associated generally with the notion of pilgrimage, extended ultimately to the Christian’s earthly journey to heaven evoking the Letter to the Hebrews in which it was written: “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” (Hebrews 11:13; King James Version of the Bible (KJV, 1611)).

Shell Oil’s logos: Greta Thunberg (b 2003) disapproves of all.

Shell’s current logo dates from 1971 and was a revision by French born US designer Raymond Loewy (1893–1986) whose work spanned a remarkable number of sectors in the era of mid-century modernism, extending from corporate logos, Studebaker’s post-war automobiles, the Coca-Cola bottle & vending machines, locomotives and farm equipment; he had quite a portfolio.  For the company, a shell was always in the branding but the first image was pure “generic shellfish” and not until 1904 did something recognizably “a scallop” appear.  Unlike the use in Christianity, the logo of Shell Oil is wholly secular.  In 1833, an enterprising trader set up in London an import company to sell seashells to collectors and it stayed a family business, the product-mix shifting when a scion (Marcus Samuel, later Lord Bearsted; 1853–1927), sent in 1892 to the Caspian Sea to collect saleable specimens, realized there was potential in exporting the “lamp oil” that bubbled from the ground.  Accordingly, the company commissioned the world’s first purpose-built oil tanker (naming it the SS Murex, from the Latin where it described a type of shellfish with a highly sculptured, elongated shell with distinctive spines or fronds) to enter the market; by 1907, the company had a fleet and “the age of oil” had begun.  The origin of the Latin murex is murky.  Etymologists suspect it may be from mūs (mouse), source of mūsculus (saltwater mussel) but, along with the Ancient Greek μύαξ (múax) (sea mussel) it may be from a Mediterranean substrate language.  So, what was once the Shell Transport and Trading Company became famous as “Shell Oil” although the corporate identity has over the years changed; long known as “Royal Dutch Shell”, it’s currently listed as Shell plc (publicly limited company), the word “oil” now avoided in corporate branding by fossil fuel traders.

Scallop theorem is from the discipline of fluid dynamics; it states that to achieve propulsion at low Reynolds number (in physics, a dimensionless parameter that determines the behavior of viscous flow patterns) in simple (ie Newtonian) fluids, a swimmer must deform in a way that is not invariant under time-reversal.  Introduced in the paper Life at Low Reynolds Number (1977) by physicist Dr Edward Mills “Ed” Purcell (1912–1997) who shared 1952 Nobel Prize in Physics, scallop theorem used math to prove that at microscopic scales (where the Reynolds number is extremely low), a swimmer executing a reciprocal motion (a sequence of movements identical when played in reverse (a la a scallop opening and closing its shell)) cannot achieve any net movement.  It means in cases where the subject’s mass is negligible compared to water's viscosity, this method of propulsion fails.  Tiny organisms (cells, bacteria and such) cannot push water out of the way and thus use flagella (whip-like cellular appendage) to move through water; the motion is thus less of a “swim” (in the conventional human sense of the word” and more of a “screw” as ship designers would understand.  At these scales, viscous forces overwhelm inertial forces, a “return stroke” perfectly cancelling the progress of a “forward stroke”; whatever the energy expended, a “microswimmer” would be left “wiggling in place”.  The theorem ceases to operate at the mesoscale (the range between between microscale and macroscale) because inertia is no longer zero so the mechanical action can provide propulsion.

Dr Purcell's Scallop Theorem explained by 632NM.

Although examples have been cited where scallop theorem doesn’t operate in situations where the definition suggests it should, it is accepted in orthodox science as a foundational principle in fluid mechanics, biophysics, and micro-hydrodynamics.  The critiques discussing the “breakdown” or “violation” of scallop theorem are not wrong but nor do they debunk, rather they provide examples of scenarios in which the theorem’s strictly defined mathematical constraints are bypassed, the most common example being “collective locomotion” in which multiple reciprocal micros-swimmers interact with one another, using their combined fields to generate movement.  Of course, in non-Newtonian Fluids (mucus, polymer solutions etc), the properties of the fluid breaks time-reversal symmetry and the necessary frictional resistance exists for the action (to varying degrees) to work.  All these so-call “edge cases” do is further validate the theorem by defining the exact boundaries where the original rules operate.

Application of a different scallop theorem: Lindsay Lohan cooking scallops & crab claws on a yacht anchored off Cannes while attending the Cannes Film Festival, May, 2017.

Stone Oven Grill's Pan Seared Scallops for two

Ingredients

10 scallops (5 per person)

Salt to taste

Pepper to taste

Truffle powder (Optional)

1 tablespoon avocado oil

¼ stick butter (some prefer to use more)

Splash of white wine (some prefer to use more)

Instructions

(1) Lay scallops out on a cutting board and pat dry on both sides with paper towels.  Season all over with salt & pepper and (optional) truffle powder.

(2) Heat avocado oil in a large pan over medium high heat and once heated, add scallops to pan.  Work scallops in batches, ensuring pan is never overcrowded the pan.  Cook for 3 minutes per side; 30 seconds before the first flip, add butter to the pan to begin the melt.

(3) After flipping scallops, begin basting them with melted butter; continue basting process for the first two minutes.  While basting need not be continuous, it must periodically be done during this time.  Add white wine with 1 minute remaining and continue to baste, removing scallops once final minute is up.  Serve immediately.

Notes

Pan seared scallops, mid sear.

With a texture unique in the world, scallops offers many possibilities and the pan seared variety is a favorite, one of its many attractions being needing few ingredients, simple equipment (there are “basting spoons” available but a standard dessert spoon is serviceable) and but a few minutes preparation time.  It’s also one of those dishes amateur chefs can create at home and emulate exactly what real chefs so in real restaurants; it’s that simple.  Chefs do however have a few tips to prefect the process: (1) Pat scallops dry prior to cooking.  This is vital because it will remove any excess moisture liquid that can hinder the formation of the crust, a perfect crust being the essence of the dish.  The patting process takes only a couple of minutes: Lay them out flat and pat both sides dry with and absorbent paper towel.  (2) Pan must be hot prior to beginning the searing.  (3) Do not overcrowd pan.  While it’s tempting to fill the whole surface area, results are much better if no scallops are touching with each given a little “room to move”.

Evening gowns with scalloped necklines in a vibrant red by Georges Hobeika (b 1962) from his Spring-Summer 2017 Collection.  The scalloped cut-outs framed a sheer illusion panel, with an understated waist bow and the look worked best with a sleeveless bodice (left), the full-length sleeves and additional intricacy (right) a distraction.

Although never has the scalloped neckline defined the look of a season, never has it vanished and even if from time-to-time seen only rarely on the catwalk, it has remained a staple of high street fashion.  In the narrow technical sense, something qualifies as a “scalloped hem” by virtue of the shape being repeated along whatever line is being finished but the effect is most obvious only beyond a certain dimension.  If the arc of the curves is too small, the look can “become lost” although, paradoxically, the small scale most closely emulates the edge of a scallop’s shell.  While it shouldn’t be treated as a “rule”, as a general principle, smaller scalloping adds refinement while a larger cut is a “statement” or “playfulness” (depending on the garment) so it’s best to keep intent aligned execution.  What is possible successfully to achieve is dependant also on the fabric or material used, some scalloping demanding a degree of rigidity (such as with necklines although heavier fabrics can be difficult to persuade into the right contour) while other uses (like a skirt’s hem) can be more free-flowing.  On an outfit that really “busy”, scalloping can “get lost” in all the detail though that can work as a “highlight among highlights” if well done; it not, it’s just “making a mess”.  That’s why scalloping is recommended as a focal point, existing as the sole feature to draw the eye, explaining why designers like to add them to something sleeveless or strapless on a garment with little other detailing, even the most delicate lace inserts tending to draw the eye.

Lindsay Lohan in a black, off-the shoulder, floral cat-suit (with embedded crystals) from Balenciaga’s Summer 2024 collection, Kering Foundation’s annual Caring for Women dinner, The Pool, New York City, September 2024.

Although by any standards a “busy” fabric, this is an example of how scalloped neckline can work well if integrated with the whole.  Here, what the scallops did was “follow the pattern” and with the whole ensemble (including the very pointy knife pumps and “built-in” demi-gloves) in black, there was nothing extraneous to disturb the line.  What was clever about this piece was that although “floral” motifs intrinsically are made from curves, the overall effect was of straight lines (horizontal, vertical and diagonal) and that included the “squared-off” neckline, producing a nice effect highlighting the clavicles and bare shoulders.

1953 Aston Martin DB3S (Works).

When applied to cars, the term “scallop” is used with a different emphasis than with frocks and such in that what’s being referenced in the shell’s inside, the idea being of a shell used to “scoop out” some sand from where the sea has just receded, the lacuna creating a “scalloped” effect.  The Aston Martin DB3S was the factory’s standard competition model between 1953 and 1956 and despite being rather hastily improvised after the DB3 (1951-1953) was found to be uncompetitive (underpowered and too heavy), it enjoyed some success although it ran in an era when the Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR (W196S) and Jaguar D-Type had been perfected so championship trophies proved elusive.  The performance was however competitive and it was tough and reliable; as well as the eleven built for the factory’s team, a further 20 were sold to private teams and like the Maserati 250F, it enjoyed around the world a long career, running near the front even after obsolescent.

1953 Aston Martin DB3S front brake and scallop.  The holes were one of the many ways attempts were made to reduce temperatures (and thus “brake fade”) when using drum brakes; it was a lost cause, the answer being disc brakes.

The distinctive scallops in the “pontoon” front fenders were functional in being the most effective way to provide much-need cooling for the big Al-Fin aluminum, finned drum brakes.  Although the works cars quickly would adopt the vastly superior Girling disc brakes, right to the end of production these were an expensive option on the “customer” cars; tellingly, in the decades since, many such DB3s were upgraded to discs (some on all four wheels but most with a front disc-rear drum combination.  Although ducts to deliver cold air to brakes had long been common, the scallops were a most effective way to evacuate the hot air although, in one of those trade-offs familiar in engineering, the shape did at high-speed induce some unwanted handling characteristics, an experience many manufacturers would suffer in an age before prior testing in wind-tunnels became de rigueur and computers on which to run simulations were far in the future.  The DB3S was replaced by the DBR1 which used a form of brake cooling that didn’t so affect the aerodynamics and it proved effective, winning the 1958 World Sports Car Championship including a prized victory in the Le Mans 24 Hour endurance classic.

1958 Ferrari 250 TR.

With the standardization of disc brakes, Aston Martin didn’t carry over the DB3S’s deeply scalloped pontoon fenders but in 1958 they appeared on updated versions of the Ferrari 250 TR (Testa Rossa (literally “red head”, an allusion to the color of the cam covers), 1957-1961).  Although the looks and “end of an era” vibe have made the 250 GTO (1962-1964) the most prized (and expensive) vintage Ferrari, on the circuits, the 250 TR was much more successful, three times winning Le Mans (the final variant in 1962 the last front-engined car to win the event) and the World Sports Car Championship constructor's title.  The scallops were used on the 250 TR for the same reason Aston Martin fitted them: cooling the drum brakes.  Ferrari’s reluctance to adopt disc brakes will seem strange because by 1957 the technology was well proven; while the early disc system were sometimes noisy and pedal pressures could be high, they were effective, stopping distances shorter and fade less prevalent.  However, because Ferrari’s focus was on longer-distance events rather than sprint races, virtues like reliability and robustness were afforded a premium and it was true there were advantages, the linings in drums wearing consistently unlike the pads on discs that suddenly could lose efficiency; additionally, the hard linings of a drum brake’s shoes lasting longer than the pads of the era, meaning it often was possible to complete an event without a lining change.  None of that much convinced the drivers who wanted better brakes and the technology anyway continued to evolve, improvements by Girling meaning Aston Martin’s pit crews were by 1958 able to effect a brake-pad change in some 45 seconds, less time than it then took to re-fuel.  In 1959, Ferrari accepted reality had bitten and disc brakes became a standard fitting on all 250 TRs.  One quirk of the production history is that of the 33 250 TRs built, the 19 allocated had either the scalloped “pontoon fenders” or an enveloping front section while the 14 sold to private customers were all “scalloped”.

1958 Lincoln Continental Mark III Convertible.

Despite the coincidence in the timing, it can with certainty be said neither the Aston Martin nor the Ferrari in any way influenced Lincoln’s designers, despite distinctive “scalloped” front fenders appearing on the 1958 Lincoln Continental Mark III, a vehicle that was a remarkable change from the restrained elegance of the (highly unprofitable) Continental Mark II (1956-1957).  Although eye-catching, the Lincoln’s scallops probably don’t make as much of an impression as they might because they have to compete for attention with other “highlights” of the styling including dagmars, slanted headlights in hoods, fins, rear fender skirts, skegs and a reverse-angle rear window; it was quite a gallimaufry, assembled in a package measuring 229 inches (5,817 mm) bumper-to-bumper.

Model Adriana Fenice (b 1994) in pink stretch top with scoop neckline.

In fashion, the “scoop” neckline uses a “scalloping” effect analogous with the use by Aston Martin, Ferrari and Lincoln, the industry jargon having separate terms to avoid confusion between a “scooped” and “scalloped” neckline.  Technically, the Mark III was conventional (just scaled-up) but it’s of note because at the time it was the largest passenger vehicle ever built using unitary construction (ie no separate chassis); it still is.  While a notable achievement in pre-modern body engineering, so much internal strengthening was required (especially for the convertible) that weight could be between 5,000–5,700 lb (2,300–2,600 kg), out-weighing even a modern EV (electric vehicle) like the Tesla Model S (2012-2026) that weighed in between 4,300–5,000 lb (1,950-2,270 kg) and the Lincoln didn’t have the excuse of carrying a big battery weighing 1,000-1377 lb (454-625 kg)).  The Lincoln also had drum brakes that, like the Ferraris, sometime fought an unequal battle with the physics of inertia.  The look really was “too much” (the “moment” for such things quickly passed) and was toned-down for 1959 & 1960 although what’s often forgotten is the 1958 range out-sold the 1961 version, the latter now regarded as a classic.  However, while the 1958-1960 body was a cul-de-sac, the 1961 Lincoln Continental endured for the rest of the decade and influenced the industry in a way (and to an extent) the earlier cars never did.  What happened in 1958 proved an outlier with scallops since only hinted at.

Tit

Tit (pronounced tit)

(1) Any of numerous small active old world songbirds of the family Paridae, especially those of the former genus Parus.

(2) Medieval slang for a girl or young woman thought something of a minx.

(3) A small, worthless or worn-out poor horse; a nag (archaic).

(4) Slang for a despicable or unpleasant person (archaic).

(5) Slang for a teat (used in agricultural and other circles).

(6) As titbit, a small morsel of food (historic English use, tidbit now the mor common form and universal in the US).

(7) One of the many vulgar slang terms for the human female’s breast (mammary gland).

(8) A light blow or hit (sometimes merely gestural or symbolic).  This use as a stand-alone noun has long been obsolete but the sense survives in the phrase "tit for tat").

(9) Lightly to strike; to pat or tap (obsolete). 

(10) To taunt, to reproach, to castigate (obsolete). 

Circa 1600: From the mid sixteenth century Middle English titte, from the pre 1100 Old English titt and cognate with the Middle Low German & Middle Dutch titte, the German as zitze, the Icelandic tittr and the Norwegian titta.  The Scandinavian forms applied to small birds and the Old English titt was a variant of teat.  The modern slang variation, attested from 1928, seems to be a recent reinvention from teat, used apparently without awareness it’s a throwback to the original form although the form is on record from 1746 as an English and Irish diminutive of teat, used in nurseries.  The verb forms (lightly striking; reproaching) are obsolete.  Tit is a noun & verb, titlike is an adjective and titting & titted are verbs; the noun plural is tits.

A pair of small tits and a pair of great tits: Bushtits (Psaltriparus minimus, left) and great tits (Parus major, right), the word order of the latter descriptor distinguishing use from the more common idiomatic form: "a great pair of tits".

Among the smaller tits is the bushtit (Psaltriparus minimus), found in the US Pacific Northwest, the tiny songbird typically 100-110 mm (3.9-4.3 inches) in length and weighing 4–6 grams (0.14–0.21 oz).  The pygmy tit (Psaltria exilis) is smaller and a monotypic now within the genus Psaltria (it was previously placed, along with the rest of its family, with the true tits (Paridae).  The largest of the tits is the widely distributed great tit (Parus major) which measures usually between 135-155 mm (5.3-6.1 inches) in length and weighs 16-21 grams (6-.81 oz).  In ornithology, tits, chickadees, and titmice constitute the Paridae, a large family of small passerine birds found mostly in Africa and the more temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere and Africa.  Most were formerly classified in the genus Parus; in the English-speaking world the terms chickadee & titmice tend to be used in North America while its elsewhere it's  “tits all the way” (the Americans also resisted  “titbits” and were more reassured by “tidbits”).  The creatures are mainly small, stocky, woodland species with short, stout bills, some with crests and ranging in length between 4-9 inches (100-220 mm); they have a mixed diet including seeds & insects and have adapted well to co-habitation with humans in urban environments.  It seems linguistically pleasing ornithological taxonomy has given English the black-breasted tit (Periparus rufonuchalis), the cinnamon-breasted tit (Melaniparus pallidiventris) and the stripe-breasted tit (Melaniparus fasciiventer).

The origin of familiar use of “tit” as slang for “breast, human female mammary gland” (now also as "tittie" or "titty" although they also enjoyed other meanings) lies in the Old English titt (teat, nipple, breast), used as a variant of teat or from the dialectal and nursery diminutive plural variant “titties”.  Perhaps surprisingly, it appears the modern slang use in this context (predictably, almost always in the plural) is documented only from 1928 (though oral use may have pre-dated this) and the adoption (actually a re-invention) may be unconnected to the original form.  The tradition was however long because in the Middle English the singular was often tete or tate, often used figuratively to mean both “source of (spiritual) nourishment” and by the late fourteenth century, an “object of erotic attraction”.  In modern slang use, it appears the use of “tits” was almost exclusively male until the 1970s when it became of the words “reclaimed” by feminists as a political statement although, as a general principle women seem still to prefer “boobs” while there is among them (usually in a disparaging sense) acceptance of “fake tits” as a critique.

Shima-Enaga in flight (left) and young lady with her pair of Shima-Enaga plushies.

The Shima-Enaga (シマエナガ) is most prolific in the region of Hokkaido, Japan but they inhabit the entire Paleatrictic (a bio-geographic realm of the Earth and the largest of the eight defined; mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere, it extends eastward from Europe, across Asia, north of the foothills of the Himalayas, to the Bering Strait and south to the Mediterranean Basin, North Africa & northern Arabia.  It thus encompasses several bioregions and freshwater eco-regions).  The Shima-Enaga is a sub-species of the long-tailed tit (also as long-tailed bushtit) and is famous for its fluffy appearance and snowman-like features (especially in winter when they puff up their feathers to stay warm), leading it popularly to be known as the “snow fairy”.  Social creatures, they are renowned for their curious and active behaviour; living mostly on arthropods (mostly insects), they also eat a variety of vegetable matter.  The word “cute” could have been invented for the Shima-Enaga and they’re a staple of the vibrant Japanese plushie industry.

By the 1540s “tit” was used for a small or unproductive horse, the sense of something “diminutive” transferring over later centuries to other small creatures, most enduringly in birds such as the titmouse, tom-tit, titlark, titling, tit-babbler etc although not all survived to be added to modern taxonomy such as the late nineteenth century titty-todger (a wren); it seems a shame we no longer have titty-toger in the lexicon.  In the Nordic nations, the Icelandic tittr, the Norwegian tita and the Old Norse titling were all used of small birds but etymologists are uncertain about the connection, the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) suggesting the link was of either something small (not of necessity specific to birds) or even onomatopoeic, drawn from the “chip-chipping” sound of small songbirds.  At least by 1706 it was common slang for “titmouse” and by 1734 was used figuratively of persons but between the sixteenth & eighteenth centuries a “tit” could be a “girl or young woman” and while that could be merely descriptive, it was applied often in the deprecatory sense of “a hussy or minx” (though apparently not actually a prostitute).

Big tits are not always what they seem.

Some years ago, an image circulated on internet's “usual suspect” sites; it purported to show a wax-paper bag from the 1930s, used originally as packaging for “Big Tits Potato Chips” manufactured by the Tart-Chestnut Company of Dunn, North Carolina.  The back-story was the name came from “Big Tits” being the nickname of the rather corpulent Mr Titus Tart, one of the operation's co-owners (the implication presumably he was over-fond of his factory's products).  As might be suggested by a product called “Big Tits” coming from a the “Tart-Chestnut” concern, it was fake news although that didn't stop debates about whether the use of “tit” in its modern sense was part of US vernacular in the Carolinas by the 1930s, some even suggesting the linguistic innovation may not have penetrated south of the Mason-Dixon line because there, dictionaries of slang may have been banned from public libraries on grounds of obscenity.  Plausibility might have been enhanced had the image been rendered with a little patina although as an emulation of 1930s packaging it did seem a creditable job, the art deco typeface a nice period touch and even the colors recalled the inter-war years (1919-1939).

Lindsay Lohan with a table of titbits: Ruffled top by Christian Siriano (b 1985), necklace by Swarovski, photo-shoot for Who What Wear UK, November 2022.

The form “titbit” (small, delicate snack of food; a sweet morsel) was in use by the 1630s and was synonymous with “tidbit” which was in concurrent use, the coining of that thought to be the dialectal tid (fond, solicitous, tender (itself perhaps influenced by the relevant sense of “tit”)) + bit (in the sense of “a morsel”).  Tidbit was once the common use in the UK & other parts of the old British Empire but in US English was vanishingly rare, tidbit long preferred.  Also surviving into modern use is “tit for tat”, (an expression indicating “a retaliatory return”), first documented in the 1550s and from this ultimately came “titfer” which appeared in UK dictionaries of rhyming slang as a substitute for “hat” (in from the “that” element in “this for that”).  “Tit for tat” may have been a variant of the earlier “tip for tap” (blow for blow), carrying the same meaning.  The game tick-tack-toe (noughts & crosses) was so named at least by 1892 but, according to oral historians, decades before it had been known as tit-tat-toe (by 1852, in reminiscences of earlier years), the name thought derived from the sound made by the pencil on the slate with which it originally was played by schoolboys.  The modern slang “taking the bull by the tits” is an absurdist variant of “taking the bull by the horns” (confronting a problem and dealing with it in a manner prompt, resolute & effective”); it suggests someone is doing something wrong or has misunderstood (ie they have NFI).

Hung out to dry.

Titlings being prepared on the shores of a Norwegian fiord.  First crossing the seas with the Vikings (the food was ideal for long voyages) in the 800s, stockfish is still an industry in Norway and is reputedly the world’s oldest, continuously practiced export trade. That's disputed by some in the Middle & Far East who cite products such as silk, honey, figs, dates and such and it all seems to hinge on hoe one defines “continuously”.

The noun titling (plural titlings) can be unrelated to avian and other uses of “tit” and its derived forms.  At law, a titling was a legal right to property (ie holding a valid title defensible against other claims).  The word was used also in publishing (deciding on a title) and by printers (impressing the title on the back of a book); as a verb, titling was thus the present participle and gerund of title.  The noun use does however extend to birds and even the fish trade.  A titling could be either a hedge sparrow (dunnock, titlene, Prunella modularis) or the meadow pipit (Anthus pratensis) while among fishmongers, it referred to the stockfish (cod (or similar species) having been cut open and cured in the open air without salt (the terms for the “dried & salted catch” included klipfish and salt cod).  Stockfish was from Middle English stokfissh & stokfysch, from the Middle Dutch stocvisch and/or the Middle Low German stokvisch (stick fish), that from the fish being dried in the open air on sticks or poles.

In the pre-refrigeration age, dried fish was a staple of the industry although, as an open-air process, it was climate-dependent but, being a long-lasting product (safely, it could be stored for years), exports in bulk were common, the business in the British Isles common enough for some traders to be styled “stockfishmongers” and, in early medieval London, the area around Thames Street (near St Magnus the Martyr church) was known as Stockfishmonger Row because it was here the trade was concentrated; the product was an important, year-round source of low-cost nutrition.  Until 1512, the stockfishmongers of London (then, like many professions, family concerns handed from father-to-son) operated as a distinct trade association at which point they merged with the other (fresh) fishmongers to form the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers, one of the Great Twelve Livery Companies of the City of London (unlike the Freemasons, there’s nothing to suggest the fishmongers were notorious plotters & schemers) and it was a respectable business, one fourteenth century stockfishmonger serving three terms as Lord Mayor of London.  That was an office of some note, known in the thirteenth century Latin as Dominus (lord or master) before by the early 1400s being styled “Lord Mair”.  Mair was from the Middle English maire, from the Old French maire (head of a city or town government), a substantivation of the Old French maire (greater), from the Latin maior (bigger, greater, superior (a comparative of magnus (big, great) and doublet of major)).  It was cognate with the Old High German meior (estate manager, steward, bailiff (enduring in modern German in the surnames Meyer & Meier)) and the Middle Dutch meier (administrator, steward, bailiff).  It displaced the Old English burgealdor (a ruler of a city, mayor, citizen), burhġerēfa (boroughreeve) (headman of a borough or district) & portġerēfa (portreeve) (headman of a port).  In the 1500s, Lord Mayors became the first officials to be styled “Right Honourable” (now most associated with privy counsellors although certain members of the peerage also enjoy a right to the title).

Meier & Meyer are in Germany common surnames (something like “Smith” or “Jones” in English), sometimes used in idiomatic expressions.  Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945) came to regret his use, telling the nation on the outbreak of World War II (1939-1945): “No enemy bomber can reach the Ruhr. If one reaches the Ruhr, my name is not Göring.  You can call me Meyer.”  Göring well knew the expression of the era: “The bomber will always get through” but had come to believe his own publicity about the invincibility of the Luftwaffe (the German air force), confident it was only his bombers that would get through.  Unfortunately for him, the RAF (Royal Air Force) didn’t believe the publicity (propaganda) and staged their first small-scale air-raids on Berlin in 1940, doing little damage but denting Göring’s prestige.  Cynical Berliners were noted for their sardonic humor and quickly dubbed the air-raid warning sirens “Meyer’s trumpets”, re-naming the Reichsmarschall: “Herr Meyer”.  However, unlike many politicians (then and now), Göring took the view people telling jokes about him meant he was popular and these his staff collected, pasting them (along with cartoons & caricatures) into a scrapbook that gleefully he would read; there’s no record of him seeking retribution on the authors.  Indeed, late in the war, caught in the open during an air raid, as hastily as was possible for someone of his bulk, he made his way into the closest underground shelter and joined the crowd, announcing cheerfully: “Herr Meyer is here.”  He was well-received.

Eidetic

Eidetic (pronounced ahy-det-ik)

(1) Of, relating to or constituting visual imagery vividly experienced and readily reproducible with great accuracy and in great detail.

(2) In anthropology, political science, sociology etc, of or relating to eidos (the formal content of a culture, encompassing its system of ideas, criteria for interpreting experience, etc).

(3) In psychiatry and neuroscience (as eidetic memory), of visual (or sometimes auditory) images, exceptionally vivid and allowing detailed recall of something previously perceived (most common in young children, the capacity appearing to diminish as language develops).

(4) Relating to or subject to such imagery.

(5) The (1) essence or (2) perfect, vision of an object or concept.

(6) In psychoanalysis (of dreams), as “eidetic memory”, a dream that can be “seen in the mind” so vividly it appears to be “movie-like”.

(7) In philosophy and phenomenology (as “eidetics”), the study of eidetic reduction (a technique used to help identify the essential components of a phenomenon by attempting to reduce it into its necessary essences).

(8) In literary criticism, writing sufficient evocative as to create in a reader’s imagination a “photo-realistic image” of what’s being described or discussed.

(9) In visual art (painting), a technique used to produce a work close to indistinguishable from a photograph (literally possible before advances in photography and photographic reproduction); the work so painted.

1924: From the from German eidetisch (pertaining to the faculty of projecting images), from the Ancient Greek εἰδητικός (eidētikós) (pertaining to images and used also in the sense of “pertaining to knowledge”), from eidesis (knowledge), the construct being εἶδος (eîd(os)) (form, shape) + -etic.  The -etic suffix was from the Ancient Greek -ητικός (-ētikós), from -έω (-éō) + -τικός (-tikós).  It was used to form adjectives meaning “pertaining to”, derived from nouns, most of which end in -esis and -esy.  Most English words formed with the suffix were from words formed in other languages (sometimes mixed), including Old, Middle and Modern French, Italian, Latin, and Ancient Greek.  Eidetisch was in 1924 coined by German psychologist Professor Erich Jaensch (1883-1940).  The back-formation dyseidetic refers to an individual found to be dyslexic (with regard to the visual aspect of written words) while the adjective “noneidetic” (not eidetic) seems one of English’s most significantly pointless words but presumably it’s useful for clinicians making case notes.  The now obsolete alternative spelling was edetic.  Eidetic is an adjevtive, eidetiker is a noun and eidetically is an adverb; the noun plural is eidetikers.  The special case of eidetics (in philosophy the study of eidetic reduction) is an example of a noun plural existing without a base noun

The term “eidetic memory” is used as a synonym of the popular “photographic memory” and an individual possessing the characteristic can in clinical use be described as an “eidetiker” (one with an “eidetic memory”); the medical literature however makes clear there is no evidence of any subject ever having exhibited a true “photographic memory” in the way the condition of “total recall” has been depicted in fiction and elsewhere in popular culture.  Sometimes, a subject may seem to have a “photographic memory” but, upon investigation, it has always been found to be something less impressive.  In the 1980s, one US television comedy had the governor of a state astonished by his secretary’s memory:

Secretary: “I’ve memorized the telephone numbers of the entire US Senate.”

Governor: “What?  All of them?”

Secretary: “Well, there are only two.”

That worked also as a “blonde joke”, a breed now proscribed under threat of cancellation.  In general use, what “photographic memory” usually indicates is “an exceptionally good memory” but often this manifests in specialized fields of learning rather than general experience.  As something more generalized, it’s most common in young children who have, by definition, a limited length of memory from which to draw and the capacity appears usually to diminish as language develops.  In adults, it definitely is a spectrum condition so the adjectival senses (the comparative “more eidetic”, the superlative “most eidetic”) can be used and in neuroscience publications “semi-eidetic (partly or partially eidetic) does appear.  That said, in the literature, there are cases of patients who suffer from being “unable to forget”, a genuinely disturbing condition for those with memories of traumatic events.  Even then however, that is an instance not of “total recall” but rather the recollected events being ones they’d prefer to forget but cannot. 

The legacy: Zur Eidetik und Integrationstypologie: Arbeiten aus dem Institut für psychologische Anthropologie an der Universität Marburg/Lahn (On eidetics and integration typology: Works from the Institute for Psychological Anthropology at the University of Marburg/Lahn, 1941) by Professor Rudolf Jaensch, Barth, Leipzig, Germany.

Although at times one of the most cited and influential psychologists of the inter-war era (1919-1939), Rudolf Jaensch is now remembered only for his work on eidetic analysis, his “eidetic hypothesis formation” still one of the standard models in psychology.  His other work in the theories of constitutional types are now little studied, largely because his reputation was sullied by his enthusiastic commitment to and prosecution of the National Socialist Gleichschaltung (coordination) and restructuring of professional & academic life in Germany after the Nazi Party gained power in 1933.  Although Jaensch joined the party only some months after Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) was appointed chancellor (the oft-quoted reference to the Nazis “seizing power” is misleading, the political & military elite miscalculating in thinking having Hitler as head of a government in which the Nazis were in a minority would leaving him “manageable” and thus “handed him” the office)) and was thus susceptible to being derided by the “old fighters” as one who joined the movement only for career advancement, he’d been affiliated with a number of the party’s organs since mid-1932.  However, he certainly made up for lost time and in March 1933 was one of several hundred professors to sign a declaration of support for the new regime but unlike many of them who genuinely were seeking only to protect their careers and families, Jaensch was an activist, denouncing those who dissented from the party’s new orthodoxies and was particularly interested in excluding Jews from academic life, seeking not only to secure their dismissal but also discredit their work.  That of course resulted in the migration of many Jewish and engineers and scientists, something that at least partially realized Hitler’s core ideological obsession but greatly would come to disadvantage Germany during World War II (1939-1945).  Hitler may have disdained “Jewish physics” but the British and Americans did not as the Irish-born UK journalist & politician Brendan Bracken (1901–1958) would later (and not wholly facetiously) explain: “We won the war because our German scientists were better than their German scientists”.

Portrait of Martin Heidegger (2017) by Mathieu Laca (b 1982).  A painter can use a retreat from photorealism for reasons that may be artistic or political.

Jaensch's involvement with the Nazis so tainted to his reputation that in the post-war years only his seminal work in eidetic theory remained “acceptable” although the “guilt by association” paradigm was never much of a feature of post Nazi Germany and that he wrote a forward to the published version of Hans Bender’s (1907-1991) revised doctoral dissertation Zur Experimentalpsychologie des Unterbewußten und der außersinnlichen Wahrnehmung (On the Experimental Psychology of the Subconscious and Extrasensory Perception) seems not to have affected Dr Bender’s flourishing career in the 1950s.  There may also been some appeal in the English-speaking world, it being hard to think of a better name then “Bender” for a psychologist working in the field of extrasensory perception.  Unfortunately, in Germanic use, while the name “Bender” was from the Middle High German benden (to bend; to twist), use was typically occupational and applied to (1) a cooper (barrel-maker), with Bender a clipping of Fassbinder or Fassbender (a cooper (ie someone who builds and repairs wooden barrels or casks by bending staves) or (2) a craftsman or metalworker (the artisans and smiths who shaped materials like wood or metal using techniques of bending and curving.  Less commonly, it could be topographic (someone who lived near a sharp curve or bend in a river or a road).  Whether, had Professor Jaensch lived to undergo the de-Nazification process of the post-war years, had he apologized for his conduct, he’d have been “sort of forgiven” in the mood of selective generosity that has seen figures like conductor Herbert von Karajan (1908–1989) and philosopher Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) to one degree or another rehabilitated is unlikely; Karajan’s association with the regime was pure careerism while Heidegger’s flirtation was brief and soon abandoned whereas Jaensch died an unrepentant Nazi and his only legacy is eidetic theory.

Eidetic memory has never appeared in the APA's (American Psychiatric Association) DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), either as a diagnostic term or disorder, presumably because it’s regarded as a natural variation in the human condition.  Although an acknowledged psychological phenomenon, the DSM does not regard an exceptional memory (however described) as pathological, even when discussing the functioning of memory in the context of neuro-cognitive or dissociative disorders.  Despite, that, the term “eidetic” is far from unknown in the psychiatric & psychological literature (professional & popular) but many publications cast a much wider net than the DSM that focuses on the diagnosis of metal disorders rather than reviewing the range of “normal” human characteristics.  So, while there are books devoted to discussing eidetic memory (and related topics) and the “self-help” shelves in bookshops often have volumes on “improving memory” or “developing a photographic memory”, that’s very different from “eidetic memory”.  For example, psychiatric teaching material describes eidetic images as visual memories of almost hallucinatory vividness but the DSM’s editors applied the same rationale when not including Aphantasia (an inability voluntarily to recall or form mental images) in their editions, the DSM being concerned primarily with phenomena insofar as they constitute clinically significant dysfunction or form part of a recognized disorder.  The eidetic memory spectrum does though remain a recognized psychological phenomenon and for clinicians that’s helpful because of the need to differentiate instances from hallucinations, a very different symptom.

In painting, there is a long “eidetic” tradition of works so photorealistic that, unless closely examined (and certainly when reproduced photographically) can be assumed to be photographs, some artists in recent years even adopting the technique as a signature.  Those still able to view art for pleasure can enjoy the perceptual ambiguity (and maybe even enjoy being fooled) but art critics know paintings are there to be criticized and while the sheer technical prowess of the artist can be acknowledged, photorealistic painting often has been treated with hostility.  It wasn’t always so because photorealism predated photography as some artists sought to achieve what would later come to be called the “hyper-realistic” and, in a nice linguistic paradox, it would be decades (well into the twentieth century) before technology had improved to the point at which a developed photograph could match the “realism” achieved by the most skilled artists, a group working not only in paint but also with pencils and, remarkably, even charcoal, a substance uniquely suitable for emulating monochromatic images.  The objection of latter-day critics was not only the predictable: “Why not just take a photograph?” but also it being known many artists actually took photographs and copied these to create their paintings.  To many critics, that meant it was less “art” than “drafting”.

Telephone Booths (1967), acrylic on Masonite by Richard Estes (b 1932), Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, Madrid, Spain.

The classic exponent of the technique was US artist Richard Estes and Telephone Booths is his best-known work in this vein.  At the technical level, the piece was most accomplished because for a painter, intrinsically, a tree in a park is a less challenging subject than some Manhattan telephone booths in their surrounds, the work demanding the rendering on a two dimensional surface, glass, shiny metal, reflections and transparencies, a grab of multiple overlapping optical images of simultaneous movement.  Now on permanent display at the Thyssen-Bornemisza, the exhibit’s curatorial notes detail the production process, the composition beginning with several photographs taken of a row of telephone booths at the intersection of Broadway, Sixth Avenue, and 34^th Street, subsequently combined as a montage.  The hyperrealism inherent in emulating photography owes something to the tradition of trompe l'oeil (deceives the eye) in that the works often were a deliberate attempt “…to confuse and disorient the viewer.  Despite depicting a recognizable scene, the complexity of the framing and the blurring of reflections require an additional effort of concentration, since nothing can be grasped at a single glance.”  The choice of setting does though hint at the way artists are selective to make the effect work, glass having the necessary characteristics to create ambiguities, the stuff simultaneously reflective and transparent.  What Estes did was use the accumulation of reflections as a “device of distortion”, some images sharply defined on the glass while others appearing on metallic surfaces slightly were warped while still allowing concurrent recognition of the booths before the eye and the buildings “behind us”, cues such as the signs of the Macy's and Woolworth there as markers of familiarity.  Making a painting from a photograph may sound simple (for those with the skill and time) but what Estes did was not mere transcription for he took his montage and rearranged it, Telephone Booths depicting a scene no single photograph recorded.  That didn’t exactly mean “montage beget collage” but it was an interesting take on “appropriating and reconstructing reality”.  For those who like the idea of telephone booths as subjects there are now fewer from which to choose but in many cities there are survivors (some re-purposed as Wi-Fi hotspots) and in Australia, one that provided vital communications when cellular (mobile) services were disabled by bushfires has been granted “Protected Heritage” status.

Central Savings (1975), oil on canvas by Richard Estes.  Reflected images were a feature of the photorealists, the scenes providing a useful layer of “pre-distortion”.

Tellingly, while Estes usually left his cityscapes devoid of human presence, in Telephone Booths there were four figures, each partially visible in the temporary sanctuary of their booth, backs to the viewer.  As a trick on the path to photorealism that was a wise choice because the almost flat expanses of a trench coat’s fabric makes the effect easier to achieve than the contours and colours of a human face.  However, for professional critic and ultracrepidarian alike, the meaning beneath (or perhaps “beyond”) is there for the viewer to take from it what they will, those better-versed in critical theory, tending sometimes to impart meaning, seeking to “know the mind of the artist”.  The Italian art critic Sandro Parmiggiani (b 1946) described those “on the phones” as “metaphors for broken voices and a faceless humanity, remaining unknowable within those impenetrable spaces, to which the stains that border their metallic edges allude as a visual rhyme, increasing the mystery and the visual bewilderment.”  Now we know.  The author John Updike (1932–2009) was no less a deconstructionist, declaring: “We know nothing about the two people on the far right, nothing except that their clothing is light-colored; we know even less about the couple on the left—they seem transparent in their oblique reflections. Thanks to the label of metropolitan crowd, these people have been reduced to mere signifiers affixed to telephone booths; like bytes.  The sounds of a computer or the strokes of a typewriter take their place and convey information. The emptiness of this information contrasts with the visual richness that the painter has imparted without sparing any effort, constructing a profoundly tender artistic irony.”  It was the Anglo-Irish satirist & Anglican cleric Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) who in the poem On Poetry: a Rhapsody (1733) included the lines:

Or else perhaps he may invent
A better than the poet meant;
As learned commentators view
In Homer more than Homer knew.

That pair of couplets became famous as a critique of overly obsessive literary critics & scholars anxious to find in texts hidden meanings and profundity, the objective perhaps not to inflate the esteem in which the author was held but enhance their own reputations; wisdom displayed by pointing out what the professor down the corridor failed to notice.  Swift may have made a famous point but mostly he was ignored and has of late been steamrollered by the post-modernists & deconstructionists able to construct “meanings in the meanings” although, unfortunately, so jargon-laden are some of their texts the meanings these formalist's documents sometimes barely are decipherable to all but fellow semioticians.  The industry has of course moved on from Homer and the words of figures like Bob Dylan (b 1941) and Jonathan Swift’s now more famous namesake (Taylor Swift (b 1989)) have been analysed as closely as any theologian has studied the Scriptures.  Dylan presumably was on occasions amused by finding out what “he really meant” and was modest, telling one interviewer he was “just a song & dance man” and another that those who “…called his lyrics poetry, probably hadn’t read much poetry”.  Still the critics clearly prevailed because in 2016 the Swedish Academy awarded Dylan the Nobel Prize in Literature, making him one of the more publicized laureates of recent decades.  Of Ms Swift’s oeuvre, meaning may be easier to find: she’s of her generation so the songs are “all about her”.

Hot Fudge Sundae (1972), oil on canvas by Ralph Goings.

The US painter Ralph Goings is sometimes said to have made photorealism “his signature” but it seems to have been more “his calling”, drawn to the technique because of a genuine “aesthetic objection” to the way pop-art artists of the 1960s were tending to expressionism (and even mannerism) in their depictions of simple, mundane objects.  Those approaches were of course “just another path to meaning” but for his bank buildings, diners (condiment sets very much a theme) and pick-up trucks, Goings emulated the camera’s objectivity although, without the original photographs, it’s not known if some licence was taken although almost certainly that happened.  While a dent in the tailgate of a parked pick-up truck is unexceptional, maybe it was added for some optical verisimilitude.  Estes’s Telephone Booths was admitted not to be a “pure” piece of eidetic imagery but a compositional piece that was a construct of what such an image might have been; Goings by contrast claimed always to be “true to the original”.

That should be treated as a statement of intent but Goings never exhibited the 35mm color slides that were his “intermediate tool” but he admitted going “beyond the photographs” in tweaking details such as light and color saturation or adjusting an inconvenient shadow.  That he used slides was also of significance because frequently, in a darkened room, he would project the images onto a primed, blank canvas, enabling him to bypass freehand drawing, instead with a pencil “tracing the grid”, meticulously rendering every the edge of every shape, contour or shadow.  That done, what’d he’d have was a kind of “paint-by-numbers” set, the canvas now an assembly of outlined shapes awaiting paint, the original photograph a legend of the color scheme.  So it could be called “craft” and the much skill and patience was demanded but whether that meant it should be called  “art” divided critics.  However, an artist’s relationship with the critics is just one aspect of life and there’s also the relationship with the auction houses and the customers; the current record sale price for a painting by Goings was some US$700,000 and his stuff definitely is now part of the “art market”.

Airstream (1970), oil on Molino by Ralph Goings (1928-2016), Mumok (Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien (Museum of modern art, Ludwig Foundation), Museumsquartier in Vienna, Austria.  Molino is a fabric-based support, often a plain-weave or un-primed textile material akin to the specialized canvas or heavy cotton & linen weaves used in Europe.  It's known also as “cotton duck canvas” but that has nothing to do with Anatidae feathers, "duck" from the Dutch doek (cloth). 

More eye-catching still was Airstream.  Still in production after 90 years, vintage Airstreams are a collectable, distinguished by their polished aluminium skins, a dramatic look that has at times been controversial because, on sunny days, the reflections from the large surface area were thought to be “distracting” for other road users.  Some owners of latter-day Shelby American Cobras (the originals (1962-1967) all painted) who opted for the expensive option of polished aluminum bodywork also came to rue the decision, the seductive curves showing every fingerprint.  The big Airstreams did however make a great photograph and, as Ralph Goings knew, a great photo had the potential to be a great painting though in his genre, it had to be the right photo.  Airstream was one of his favourites because he thought it best represented the possibilities in his technique and although what he did was in a sense “mechanical”, it could also be exacting, a few square inches of canvas sometimes taking days to complete.  For Goings, the paintings are best thought of as his “love affair with America”.

Lindsay Lohan rendered in the style of nineteenth century Impressionism (right) by Gemini.ai.  The digital version was based on a photograph (left) of her in a Jill Sander (b 1943) gown in light chartreuse from the Spring 2023 collection (with a Tyler Ellis (b 1984) Clutch, Joseph Saidian & Sons Vintage Marquise & Baguette Cut Diamond, Anabela Chan Orchid Diamond Cascade Earrings and Piferi Fade Sandals by Alfredo Pīferi (b 1987)) while attending the Disney Legends Awards ceremony, Anaheim, California, August, 2024.  On the day, although the environment was not optimized for photography, the light and breeze cooperated, the gown’s fabric swishing in a way the Impressionists would have painted, even had the air been still.  In the 2010s, as video cards became more powerful, software emerged to allow users to take photographs and re-create them in a wide variety of modes including pencil sketches, water colors, oils and even styles such as cubism.  This was the opposite process from that used by hyperrealists such as Estes and Goings; now generative AI makes possible just about anything able to be displayed on a screen.

The paradox of course was that Airstream was the exemplar of a painting functionally indistinguishable from a photograph thus illustrating the usual critique: What’s the point?  Why not just produce prints of the photograph, something able to be done in limitless quantities and at marginal cost?  That’s a classic utilitarian question and one that ignores a concept like l'art pour l'art (art for art's sake) but then, other than as generators or economic value, utilitarians likely thought society gained little benefit from movements such as vorticism, cubism, abstraction, expressionism and such.  There was also elitism in the disdain; photorealism associated with craft, folk-art, advertising, ordinary consumer objects and other fields tainted by commercialism (although the art-mafia was untroubled by their business being focused on money like few others).  Still, contemporary conceptual and abstract art was thought intellectually sophisticated in a way “copying photographs” could never match, the technical virtuosity less valued than the imagination of the “true artist”.  Despite all that, photorealism did find a niche and is now an accepted part of the industry.

The Hay Wain (1821), oil on canvas by John Constable (1776–1837), National Gallery, London (left) and Flatford Mill from a Lock on the Stour (circa 1811), oil on canvas by John Constable, Royal Academy of Arts, London (right).

John Constable was among the last generation of painters to live before the age of photography and although now regarded as one of the greatest of Britain’s landscape artists, in his lifetime he enjoyed only modest commercial success; not until the age of 52 was he elected to the RA (Royal Academy of Arts).  The two paintings above are examples of the different ways he painted, the high Romantic Flatford Mill from a Lock on the Stour noticeably less “realistic” than The Hay Wain, a work among his most elegiac.  Viewed retrospectively, as the technology of photography improved, there would have been times when each of these paintings could be deemed photorealistic (if, for purposes of comparison, rendered in gray-scale or sepia) but that was not the dominant artistic measure of the era.  It’s not known when Constable made his remark: “My pictures will never be popular for they have no handling, but I do not see handling in nature” (the quote appearing (undated) in Memoirs of the Life of John Constable, Esq (1843) by the UK-based US genre painter Charles Robert Leslie RA (1794–1859)) but it’s tempting to think it might have been before painting Flatford Mill, a work executed with notable “handling”.  Constable used “handling” (then trade jargon among the critics) to describe the painter’s visible manner of applying paint, the brushwork, facture, finish and characteristic “touch” by which a viewer could see how the artist worked their brush.  The comparison was something like the difference between watchmakers who took care to conceal their creations’ movements and those who made visible the wheels & cogs, Constable in effect saying “nature shows no painterly technique, so why should an artist?”  Time of course doesn’t display the mechanism of how it works any more than do the clouds in the sky: both just are.  The critics though were society’s opinion-makers (especially among those who actually paid arts for their work) and in Constable's time, an academic landscape painter of renown was expected to demonstrate skilful, controlled brushwork that made visible the mechanics of the action.  Not all did it in the same way but the most commercially successful had their ways of making obvious how the oil was blended and modulated, clouds, rocks, foliage and all the elements of landscape rendered through established conventions.  As well as the beauty of what was being depicted, the artist's execution was there to be admired.

The Opening of Waterloo Bridge seen from Whitehall Stairs, 18 June, 1817 (circa 1832), oil on canvas by John Constable, Tate Britain, London.  In the industry’s classification system, Constable is listed as a painter of landscapes, in the Romantic tradition but as much as anything, he was a painter of skies and cloudscapes.

Constable made no secret he thought these conspicuous displays of artistic virtuosity as “bravura”, preferring to be what he called a “natural painter” depicting the “natural environment”.  Discarding, the bravura taught during his student years, he eschewed “showing off” and let nature do the talking; nature having no brushstrokes and trees, clouds and sunlight without “handling”, manifesting only as optical phenomena.  That was what Constable wanted to paint.  He was though a realist and in some of his work there is much of his signature “handling”, rough, broken, apparently (though doubtlessly not) spontaneous brushwork applied in flecks, dabs, flecks, streaks and thick impasto (paint applied thickly to create a topography of peaks and crests that, in physically extending from the surface, lends something of a 3D (three-dimensional) effect), sometimes obviously using paint unmixed and straight “from the tube”.  Constable didn’t change his view that he wanted viewers to focus on the painting rather than the independent performance of the painter but whether “Constable 2.0” was an evolving artist or one adapting to commercial reality in “surrendering art to artifice” can be debated but what no historians dispute is that the later impressionists owed a debt to this exemplar of the Romantic movement.  Constable now is more highly regarded than ever he was in his lifetime.