Our curated shoe exhibit for this month is entitled “Nudes in Shoes” - and it will really knock your socks off!

The exhibit - which comprises ten works of art, dating from around 500 BCE through 1939 - is a fascinating look at women throughout history. Though the underlying theme is undeniably erotic, the women portrayed play myriad roles. Some are, of course, prostitutes, situated in the boudoir and wearing their reliably symbolic sheer stockings. Other of the paintings are more allegorical: The work of Felicien Rops illustrates his belief that women are the incarnation of evil; Hanns Ludwig Katz’s painting makes reference to the horrors of World War I; Nazi-era painter Adolf Ziegler’s work demonstrates the purity of the Aryan woman.

We see all kinds of shoes depicted in the exhibit: The woman depicted on the Greek vase has on flat, strappy sandals - it’s too early (and the wrong empire) for gladiators, perhaps instead she’s wearing the ancestor of the caged sandals we’ve been hearing so much about lately? We also see pointy-toed Crackows, boldly-colored slip-ons, heeled flip flops, even ankle boots (which, as the ladies from What Not To Wear might claim, can be a tough look to carry off when you’re nude).

And, even though you won’t hear our (or any) curator say it, one ancillary theme for the exhibit could even be that shoes are the least dispensable part of any ensemble.

8/11/08 Update: This exhibit was on display through August 8, 2008.

As any shoe collector knows, shoes are more than just leather (or vegan material) and fabric. Each pair we welcome into our closet is an individual, with its own energy and personality. That’s one reason shoe collecting is so compelling (and one reason we built Fantastic Toe).

With that in mind, we are thrilled to present the work of award-winning painter Ellen Rolli in this month’s curated shoe exhibit. Her series of textured and lively shoe paintings very aptly illustrates our “shoe-as-individual” philosophy.

Using bold strokes, rich colors, and intelligent composition, Ellen communicates the essence of each pair of shoes in the exhibit: The purple stilettos — exotically-toned and half-hidden – convey a mysterious and erotic energy; the librarian-esque t-straps, visible head-on, telegraph no-nonsense practicality; the ruby red pumps pop off their blue background, making as bold a statement on canvas as they would on your feet. Each of the other paintings in the series is similarly evocative.

Ellen, who is known informally as the “Shoe Lady”, gathers most of her shoe inspiration from her 24-year-old daughter (a real “shoe nut,” according to Ellen). She typically works in a series, and says that “When painting a particular subject, I become so familiar with the subject matter that I can delve into the excitement of the painting process with confidence and passionate energy. I apply paint generously with a direct, painterly, expressive and intuitive approach. I want my process to show through.”

Ellen’s paintings are no longer on display. For more information about Ellen, visit her website at www.ellenrolli.com.

Today marks the debut of a really fun feature on Fantastic Toe: our curated shoe exhibits.

Every once in a while, we will assemble and post an exhibit of noteworthy shoes in art, the movies, or other medium — sometimes from a bygone era, sometimes contemporary. We’ll post them under the member name “Curator”; you can always find the current exhibit by searching on that name from the Browse Collections interface.

Curator’s first exhibit, “Twist! Monkey! Frug! (Shoe Ads from the 1960s)“, is worth looking at not only for the shoes (which are really quite stunning — check out the Christian Diors and the Charles Jourdans in particular) but also because the beautifully photographed ads are themselves works of art, and the ad copy (from which our exhibit title is excerpted) very much reflects the era. 

For the most part, these are couture shoes — the ads ran in Vogue and similar magazines, here and in France, between 1965 and 1969 — so you won’t find any of what some might call the more outrageous shoes of the 1960s. Instead you’ll see lower heels, more muted colors, wonderfully simple lines. (Can’t you just picture Faye Dunaway wearing these in 1968’s The Thomas Crown Affair?) Needless to say, these are not the shoes that marched on Washington.

One brand in the exhibit with an interesting back story is the venerable but now defunct I. Miller. Its founder and namesake, Israel Miller, who died in 1929, built several shoe stores in New York City; the flagship, located at 46th and Broadway and in operation through the 1970s, bore the inscription “The show folks’ shoe shop dedicated to beauty in footwear.” Even more wonderful, the exterior wall contained 4 sculpture niches, each of which housed a likeness of a prominent woman in the arts. What a branding strategy! The building is now in slight disrepair, but nonetheless it surely belongs on any shoe lover’s tour of New York City.

See how fun this is? Where else can you mix in a little architectural history with your shoe lust? Check out the exhibit, and check back soon for the next one.