Lithium Magazine
  • Home
  • About
    • Editors
    • Writers
    • Artists
    • Photographers
  • Contact
    • Work With Us
  • Events
  • Shop
  • Read
    • Sex & Love
    • Culture & Entertainment
    • Activism, News, & Politics
    • Life
    • Photography
Instagram
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
Followers
Followers
Lithium Magazine
Lithium Magazine
  • Home
  • About
    • Editors
    • Writers
    • Artists
    • Photographers
  • Contact
    • Work With Us
  • Events
  • Shop
  • Read
    • Sex & Love
    • Culture & Entertainment
    • Activism, News, & Politics
    • Life
    • Photography
  • Photography

The Silly Things We Miss

  • October 29, 2020
  • No comments
  • 2 minute read
  • Abigail Tulenko
Processed with VSCO with hb2 preset

I took these photos of Anna on a sunny autumn afternoon in Georgetown. We’ve spent the past few weeks in a quiet neighborhood with a few friends—our pod. The word “pod” strikes me as an oddly cutesy way to describe a group of people with whom you’ve chosen to survive a pandemic. But words are often strange like that, slightly ill-fitted to their usage, tinged with misty connotations.

The word “glamour” has an interesting etymology. It originally comes from a Scottish word for occult rituals, meaning a type of deceptive enchantment. It wasn’t until the early 20th century and the rise of Hollywood that the word came to be associated with allure and romance.
Since quarantine started, one of the things I’ve been surprised to miss is the process of getting ready—the anticipation and care that goes into styling oneself for an event. Of course, we can still do our makeup and dress up, but it isn’t the same when we can’t go anywhere. It seems like a central component of glamour is performance, and so its spell is broken without the promise of an audience. In this series, I evoke old Hollywood to investigate my personal nostalgia for glamour. How is the performance of self-presentation tied to identity? Is the nostalgia I’m feeling merely superficial? Am I retrospectively romanticizing a process that was never really that enjoyable?
The original definition of glamour implies subterfuge. These photos, like most photos, are also glamorous in this way—at best contrived, at worst a pretty lie. I posted one of them with the caption “Anna getting ready.” Anna laughed at that. Getting ready for what? To take these photos and then promptly change back into normal clothes and log onto Zoom? The truth just wouldn’t have made for a very glamorous caption.
Photos by Abigail Tulenko
Modeled by Anna Glenn
Related Topics
  • Abigail Tulenko
  • BITTER
  • glamour
  • life
  • photography
Previous Article
  • Culture & Entertainment

Red Scare and the Power of Being a Contrarian

  • October 28, 2020
  • Chloe Pingeon
View Post
Next Article
  • Photography

How to Not Give a Single Flaming Fuck

  • October 30, 2020
  • Grace Wiehl
View Post
You May Also Like
View Post
  • Photography

Chasing

  • January 25, 2021
  • Callie Keels
View Post
  • Photography

How to Not Give a Single Flaming Fuck

  • October 30, 2020
  • Grace Wiehl
View Post
  • Photography

Spotlight

  • August 27, 2020
  • Lauren Hicks
View Post
  • Photography

Wrapped Up

  • August 10, 2020
  • Callie Keels
View Post
  • Photography

A Zine on Coming of Age

  • July 28, 2020
  • Valeria Moreno
View Post
  • Photography

​Cyber-Souvenirs​

  • July 28, 2020
  • Célia Blum
View Post
  • Photography

Is This Now?

  • July 27, 2020
  • Savanna Ruedy
View Post
  • Photography

Blurred

  • July 19, 2020
  • Callie Keels

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Featured Posts
  • 1
    Sexual Empowerment or Reckless Endangerment?
    • March 2, 2021
  • 2
    What’s the Point of “Fake Accounts”?
    • March 1, 2021
  • 3
    Oops!… We Did It Again: Why We Get Off on Women’s Pain
    • February 28, 2021
  • 4
    “Whole Lotta Red”: A Feverish and Avant-Garde End to 2020
    • February 28, 2021
  • 5
    Blind Worship and the Films of Quentin Tarantino
    • February 27, 2021
Recent Posts
  • Why You Should Reject Music Elitism
    • February 26, 2021
  • Middle School Ends, But “Pen15” Is Forever 
    • February 26, 2021
  • How TV About Getting Lost Taught Me About Survival
    • February 25, 2021
Categories
  • Activism, News, & Politics (69)
  • Culture & Entertainment (141)
  • Fashion & Beauty (31)
  • Life (133)
  • Photography (63)
  • Sex & Love (68)
Search
Instagram
OnlyFans, selling worn underwear, sex work—are these acts of sexual empowerment or reckless endangerment? As Modesty Sanchez writes, “Because OnlyFans creators are portrayed as entrepreneurs taking control of their image and brand, the role that the platform itself plays is often obscured and dismissed, especially since the company prefers to hide behind the feminist, sex-positive glow emanating from the sex workers that have flocked to the site.” Often, the dangers of online and IRL sex work are simply swept to the side while corporate exploitation is covered up by a girl boss narrative. Read the latest on Lithium now ⚡️
What’s the point of “Fake Accounts”? Written by Lauren Oyler, Fake Accounts is a perfect addition to the list of much-overhyped millennial reading: Normal People, Bad Feminist, How to Do Nothing, etc. And if Oyler wasn’t such a harsh critic of that specific literary circle, this novel would just be another pretty well-written, unmoving book. But Oyler has gone after too many media darlings like Sally Rooney, Jia Tolentino and Roxane Gay in open takedowns that center on her distaste for moralizing, self-absorbed, digital-first writing. Read Lithium writer @katwilliiams take on this book, live on the site now 📚
Britney Spears, Tessica Brown “Gorilla Glue Girl,” and trauma porn all have something in common—they are representations of our fascination with women’s pain. In @tamaravjones’s latest piece for Lithium, she points out that “It’s up to readers to support better journalism and think about the consequences before sharing their unfiltered hot takes on social media. Britney Spears’ legal battle will continue and inevitably, someone else will take Tessica Brown’s spot as the internet’s main character, and I can only hope that we manage to break this cycle before someone else gets hurt.” Live on Lithium now 💫
Playboi Carti’s newest album Whole Lotta Red is the rapper’s ARTPOP. While it’s different from a lot of the rap dominating the Billboard 100, Carti does something a lot of mainstream acts are afraid to do: experiment. Lithium writer @kaiya.shunyata dives deep into Whole Lotta Red and discusses how the album, like Lady Gaga’s ARTPOP, is a fantastic work of exploration and departure from the rap that mostly dominated 2020. Read about it now 🎧
When you’re first getting into film, you tend to hear the same names repeated over and over again: Fincher, Scorsese, and, most of all, Tarantino. But when @kaiya.shunyata rewatched his directorial debut Reservoir Dogs, she couldn’t help but think of his mistreatment of actresses (notably, Uma Thurman), his use of the N-word in films, sprinkled in like a garnish he and his fans can’t live without, and decades of controversies. She writes, “It’s become impossible to ignore the way Tarantino has been worshipped, while simultaneously not changing the things for which he’s been criticized.” Read about it on Lithium now 🎬
Middle school sux. Hulu’s Pen15 follows thirteen-year-old best friends Maya and Anna as they tackle an endless seventh-grade year. From day one, they face humiliations that only strike when you are thirteen, like bad haircuts and periods. But Pen15 sets itself apart from all the other middle school dramas by not only having good stories and actors, but drawing attention to the fact that even performing thirteen is a complex thing. Read about it now on Lithium, written by Jade Stillwell 📚
We’re all culprits in contributing to the shame and embarrassment that have become synonymous with listening to specific artists. Rex Orange County has become the unofficial pinnacle of a wannabe-indie girl who’s a regular Urban Outfitters patron. A Smiths fan is egotistical and decidedly unable to get laid. Bon Iver attracts the coffee shop connoisseur with a God complex. @elliergreenberg’s latest is all about why you should reject music elitism— this one is a must-read. Live on Lithium now 🎵
@holt.sheena’s latest piece is an ode to garage bands and punk shows past. She writes, “I loved every part of it—the moshing (which I observed, perplexed, from the sidelines), the music, the sense of belonging.” Read her latest piece on Lithium now 🎸
Shows about getting lost are meaningful in a lot of different ways, especially during the pandemic. Watching shows like Lost and Survivor make us wonder, “how do people skip their skincare routine for more than a week?” to deeper examinations of trust and acts of selflessness when storylines like allies and sacrifice come into play. Alex Eich writes, “These are both stories about our magnificent, if inconvenient, need for other people. And they taught me to find beauty in a shared will to survive.” Read about it now on Lithium 🏝

Input your search keywords and press Enter.