Monday, May 20, 2024
7 pm ET

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Humans obsession with hair goes back millennia. This applies to both our heads and our more private areas. From the ancient cultures of Egypt, Greece, and Rome to the Renaissance to modern times, we have had a love/hate relationship with pubic hair. To shave or not to shave? That is the question.

This lecture will explore the origins and use of the merkin, or pubic hair wig, in all its furry splendor and various iterations. Whether it be to look younger, healthier (cover venereal disease scars anyone?), or be sexually alluring (ever hear of vajazzling?), there is a merkin style available! So if you ever wanted to know why we refer to a woman’s pubic mound as a beaver, please join!

Professor Karen Bachmann teaches at both Pratt Institute and Fashion Institute of Technology. She specializes in both fine and bridge jewelry, wearable art, and decorative art. She has particular interests in Baroque, Renaissance, Memento Mori and Victorian wearable ornament and material culture. She is a practicing studio jeweler and a former master jeweler at Tiffany & Co. She is a past and current lecturer and workshop leader with NYC Jewelry Week. Her current line of jewelry centers anatomically correct human organs and insects which are carved in wax and cast into sterling silver or brass using the lost wax casting technique, a subject that she teaches.

Image: Roland Topor, Un bon petit diable (A Good Little Devil), 1977