Flora Marian Spore

Original story here.

The woman depicted above went from female dentist to occult artist. Not the most common career path. She turned out many paintings "inspired" by ghosts.

Unfortunately, despite a fairly substantial career, none of her paintings seem to have survived or been recorded, except for the one depicted below.

Photo from the blog of Jim Linderman.

Wikipedia entry.

Who We Are
Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over forty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. Contact Us

Comments

Oh, woe, how could we have lost such important work? Is there no physic out there willing to be guided by our lost soul so that we may recoup this great loss?

Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 10/16/12 at 09:13 AM

Found another picture of her in this book, but no more pictures of her paintings.

http://2012wubucket.s3.amazonaws.com/floraspore.jpg

Posted by Alex on 10/16/12 at 10:01 AM

Although the detail isn't there in such a small picture, I like that painting. Most modern art is just so much junk but that painting had balance. I would say that Spore did have quite an imagination.

I hope that the objects at the bottom of the painting are not extracted teeth from her previous career?

Posted by KDP on 10/16/12 at 10:09 AM

If they are there are enough there to make a pair of shoes with.

Posted by Patty in Ohio, USA on 10/16/12 at 10:24 AM

I've found a couple more (click here) under her married name. I started by Googling "Marian Spore" and heading out from there. She's not as "lost and forgotten" as it seems.

Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 10/16/12 at 10:51 AM

Good sleuthing, Expat!

Posted by Paul on 10/16/12 at 11:08 AM

I'd still like to see more of her creations. What's shown has a Hieronymus Bosch feel to them - something just beneath the surface that should scare the beejeebers out of you.

Posted by KDP on 10/16/12 at 04:00 PM

Apparently there was a book of her paintings published in 1938 titled "Loan Exhibition of Paintings (subconscious pictures)". Under her married name, Mrs. Irving T. Bush. The only library that seems to have a copy of it is the Frick Art Reference Library in NY.

She also published a book in 1947 titled They.

For those curious, here are the pictures by her that Expat found:

http://2012wubucket.s3.amazonaws.com/floraspore01.jpg

http://2012wubucket.s3.amazonaws.com/floraspore02.jpg

Posted by Alex on 10/18/12 at 10:30 AM

Well done, Alex!

Posted by Paul on 10/18/12 at 10:39 AM

like these 2 pictures much better than the other one. They all have a sci/fi feel to them.

Posted by Patty in Ohio, USA on 10/18/12 at 10:52 AM

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