This portrait from 1844 shows famous Victorian ballet dancer Fanny Cerrito, in London wearing her Esmeralda costume. The most curious thing about the painting, I feel, is the fortune telling goat. I love the decorations the goat is wearing too!
Fanny's statement ballet dress is eye catching, with its lettering around the skirt and bodice. It seems designers in the 'olden days' knew their stuff rather well :)
I have just realised something. The goat is doing a form of Ouija or Talking Board type stuff, using the floor as the board. Whatever letters the goat picks out will be translated in to a message. what I suddenly realised and what made me log back in and add this was that as stated previously, the painting was done in 1844. So this was 47 years before Ouija boards were first patented. Yet, the portrait is showing a very similar thing in essence, masses of years earlier.
