“Blake said that the body was the soul’s prison unless the five senses are fully developed and open. He considered the senses the ‘windows of the soul.’ When sex involves all the senses, it can be like a mystical experience.” ~ Jim Morrison, 1947 – 1971
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First time doing this blackout thing (is there a name for it) and have no clue what I’m doing 😁 #art #jimmorrison #thedoors #jimbo #sketchclub #graphics #illustration
Morrighan's Muse 
Nice job. The photos are iconic.
I love the doors. Morrison is a fascinating character who was kind of crazy (but whose character still was assassinated by lots of post mortem bios, particularly in the 1990s).
Thanks, Cill. It’s my first time doing something like this and it was fun. I think I’m getting the hang of it – that is, if I stop finding the mistakes!
I agree about Jimbo being a a fascinating character. That’s the thing with post-mortem bios though. They probably wouldn’t have said what they said if he’d been alive.
Since I made the comment above, I’ve remembered that some of my friends have pointed out that there are some bios of him which make him look like no one you’d ever want to know (borderline personality or worse), or made up tons of crap about his sex life. (AT least one person in a Doors’ forum I used to belong to pointed out that he seems to have been conflated with Iggy Pop in some people’s memories of the time. Otoh I don’t buy into the whole Jim&Pam=Romeo&Juliet cult). There are some good and interesting things written online about his personal life and personality by people who knew him. Some of these debunk stuff in his biographies, or in autobiographical essays about him.
I don’t know much about him but his music especially since I played The Doors a lot when I worked at a radio station. But I’m sure there must be camps that believe one thing and then the other about him.
There are. One autobiography that I read that was very interesting, even though it didn’t really dwell on him was that of Jac Holzmann, founder of Electra records. If anyone is interested in the history of late 1960s music, this is a good book imo.
However I wouldn’t have wanted to live in 1960s California, even to experience everything that was going on. It’s always seemed a pretentious place to me. Otoh, pictures of the Beatles and Stones from ca 1967-68 always seemed magical. People wore these fairy tale clothes and lived according to their own rules.
The clothes and art of the late 60s were definitely influenced by Tolkien and by 19th century fantasy as well as history. People were proud of reading poetry and literature and philosophy, and history. The attitude to women left a lot to be desired, but does again today. Who’d you rather have as a cultural icon and example for young girls: Nicky Minaj or Janis Joplin? Could anyone as real as Janis ever be considered sexy or a fashion icon (of sorts) now?
Janis: no, unfortunately that’s not what they promote as sexy these days 😦
California is still as pretentious these days as it probably was then. I don’t even recognize it now that I’m older and have moved away. I’ll check into that biography, too.
I was just reading this short story set in the 70’s and the Vietnam war and hippies and between all that is a young woman meeting her fiancée after doing a break from tour and the changes in him. Then the hippie friend from back home with the protests. Perfect timing.
The sad thing is that Janis was treated as (and thought of herself as) ugly in high school. I am glad that she had that time to change the way that people thought of women and (hopefully) the way she thought about herself.
The thing about Janis as an icon is that her beauty was in *texture* (if that makes sense) and in the 20th century it could only have happened in the 60s, In the late 60s color in clothing just exploded but one of my mentors always said that texture was as important as color in clothing from the period, especially ‘counter-culture’ clothing with all that velvet, silk, satin and suede. They all catch the light in different ways. Late 60s hair has a lot of texture too (afros, shiny curls or waves, frizz, straight and smooth). The photographers of the 60s used sunlight to create photos that had a kind of depth to them. Janis, with her frizzy hair and prominent features, necklaces and rings and multi-textured clothing kind of encapsulated a particular type of aesthetic.
Well there’s always cosmetic surgery which no one in that business now is immune to. But you’re right about the era. I’m just happy she was there during that time and we’ve been blessed by that counter-culture.
My mentor told me that cosmetic surgery of some sort (usually dental) was used as far back as the 1920s. A lot of classic stars had their teeth fixed (ever seen Greta Garbo’s original teeth?) and it’s claimed that Dietrich had some teeth removed at the back to give her a more hollow-cheeked look. (Never checked up on that). But apart from the odd nose-job (very rare seemingly) it doesn’t look like famous people in the 1960s really went in for it, certainly not in the counter culture.