The Daily Valdemar No. 55: May 7

Valdemar Andersen, vignette for the daily Politiken, ca. 1908.

Today's moment of calm is a study in human nature exposing itself.

The printing techniques and distribution of fashion plates took place in much the same way as those of cartoons in the 18th and 19th centuries and the two would come together in cartoons on the latest fashion fooleries pretending to be - tongue-in-cheek - information plates on how to look next. It was that very formula with which Kierkegaard was mocked.

Valdemar Andersen belonged to a later generation and fashionable people were a psychosocial phenomenon to him. There was an element of visual delight - as opposed to his earlier colleagues his was an artistic eye - but he would highlight their reason for performing their peacock dance before their fellow beings. One such instance was the directoire fashion at the racecourse in Eremitagen in 1908. The two dapper gentlemen before us may be from that same year and they are certainly at the races seeing that the one to the right is a jockey, while the one to the left is a racegoer with his binoculars in place. Valdemar may have seen them standing near one another or more likely he has collected inputs from a day at the races.

One is solid the other striped, but their dance moves are parallel: One elbow out to highlight a wasp waist, a dainty genuflection at the knee with one foot held out as if slowly turning and so while pretending to have all focus at the races, they are making certain that they are seen from more angle than one at any given time.