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Art of the Day: World’s Smallest Woman Arrives in Coney Island

Posted in art, sideshow, tagged Jack Constantine, San Gennaro, Single-O, World's Smallest Woman on September 2, 2012| 2 Comments »

World’s Smallest Woman Showfront, Coney Island. September 1, 2012. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

On Saturday, the World’s Smallest Woman arrived for her annual run in Coney Island prior to playing the September 13-23rd Feast of San Gennaro in Little Italy. The single-O attraction is set up in Cha Cha’s Steeplechase Park near the West 12th Street entrance. ATZ learned that this particular “World’s Smallest Woman” is named Elizabeth and hails from Haiti. She is one of sideshow impresario Jack Constantine’s five “World’s Smallest Women” who travel the U.S. carnival and fair circuit. We’ve seen this ever-popular attraction at the New York State Fair, Florida State Fair and State Fair Meadowlands, among others. Four of the ladies are Haitian and one is Jamaican.

In past years the show has charged as little as 50 cents admission. Whatever the price–it’s the front of the show that gets the dough! When the trailer-mounted showfront was unfolded, the fanciful, time-tested advertisement for the World’s Smallest Woman was revealed- “29 Tiny Inches – Hands 2 In. Wide. Size 2 Shoe – 10,000 Reward If Not Real and Alive. As Seen in LIFE – You Talk to Her – She Will Talk to You.”

Detail of World’s Smallest Woman Showfront, Coney Island. September 1, 2012. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

Art of the Day: Madame Twisto by Marie Roberts

Posted in art, sideshow, tagged Coney Island USA, Madame Twisto, Marie Roberts, sideshow banner, The Art Room on August 6, 2012| 1 Comment »

Madame Twisto Sideshow Banner © Marie Roberts. Photo by AmusingtheZillion.com

Artist Marie Roberts is a third-generation Coney Islander who has been painting the banners that emblazon the facade of Coney Island USA’s headquarters since 1997. Madame Twisto, the name bestowed on the girl who contorts herself inside the bladebox, was Marie Roberts’ very first sideshow banner. Countless Madame Twistos have graced the sideshow stage since the banner was painted. Honestly, we were surprised and delighted to see it again. Having first met Marie in 1999, the banner seems like an old friend.

This early canvas is one of dozens of the artist’s works from the past 15 years on view at the Art Room in Bay Ridge. At the opening reception on Saturday night, banners trumpeting the 2000 Mermaid Parade and Coney Island sideshow stars Insectavora, Scott Baker, Donny Vomit and the Black Scorpion mingled with a miniature banner line and recent paintings on Japanese paper. All of the work is for sale and may be viewed by appointment through August 24. You may also commission a banner portrait for your home, office, or stage persona. The Art Room will be open for Friday night’s Summer Stroll on August 10 and 17 from 6pm- 10pm.

The Art Room, 8710 Third Avenue, Brooklyn, New York 11209. Phone 347-560-6572. Email theartroomnyc@gmail.com

Up for Auction: World’s Strangest Girls Sideshow Banner

Posted in art, Auction, sideshow, tagged Ed Paschke, Phyllis Kind, Riverview Park, sideshow banner, World's Strangest Girls on May 16, 2012| 2 Comments »

Vintage Sideshow Banner for World’s Strangest Girls. Photo Courtesy of JMW Auction Gallery, High Falls, NY

Our favorite genre of word banner is on the auction block. World’s Strangest Girls! The sideshow banner asks the customary questions: “Why WERE THEY BORN? CAN they LEAD NORMAL lives? HAVE CHILDREN? HAVE NORMAL HUSBANDS? SEE & TALK TO THEM.”

We first came across the World’s Strangest Girls in the seminal 1997 book Freaks, Geeks and Strange Girls: Sideshow Banners of the Great American Midway. A splendid cavalcade banner by Snap Wyatt from the ’60s depicted an all-girl freak show–sword swallower, fire eater, tattooed lady, dancing midget, frog girl, alligator-skinned woman, and freakiest of all, a woman with tree roots instead of hands and feet.

Jay Werbalowsky of JMW Auction Gallery tells ATZ the unsigned word banner is from the collection of well-known gallerist Phyllis Kind, who closed her SoHo gallery and retired in 2009. Kind’s first gallery opened in Chicago in 1967, where she showed the work of Roger Brown, Ed Paschke and other artists who came to be known as the Chicago Imagists.

When we interviewed Paschke in the late ’90s for an essay about the influence of sideshow banners on the art world, he recalled fellow artists buying banners at the auction of Riverview Park and introducing them to him as well as to Kind. Friends presented Paschke with a banner of Siamese twins, which he had to fold in half to display on the walls of his studio. “I’ve always liked that kind of larger-than- life, over-the-top feeling,” the artist told us. “A heightened sense of reality is I guess the term I would use.”

The World’s Strangest Girls word banner is large enough–9′ 8″ x 11′ 5″– for a loft with 12 foot ceilings or a spacious lobby. Or perhaps you’d like to frame a Strange Girls show of your own and take it on the road? The sale is on May 19 at JMW Auction Gallery in the Hudson Valley town of High Falls, New York. Live bidding on the item is available on liveauctioneers.com