mariadahvanaheadley:

- Sarah Goodridge, Beauty Revealed. Self portrait miniature on ivory. 2 5/8th inches by 3 1/8th inches. American. 1828.

Let me just type that year again: 1828.

A variation on a Lover’s Eye, this was a gift from Goodridge to Daniel Webster (he who bargained with the devil in Stephen Vincent Benet’s short story) and discovered in his possessions after his death. Most descriptions of the duo’s relationship depict them as “friends and correspondents.”

Right. She painted 12 portraits of Webster over the years. He burned her letters. She kept his, and never married.

Here’s the rest of Sarah Goodridge, in another self-portrait from a couple of years later.

This little piece kills me. Cell phone porn and texted seductions are nothing new. We just keep reinventing ways to tell each other we’ve fallen in love.