Wendy Brandes Jewelry Blog

Never Is the Next New Thing

OMG This Tiny Unicorn Is Totes Gonna Ruin My Dress

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I love this 16th-century painting by Raphael.

The young lady seems to be throwing someone the side-eye. I bet she’s looking at the person who gave her that tiny unicorn to hold. She’s thinking, “No way this thing is housebroken.” And doesn’t it look like the unicorn is laughing? Yeah, I wouldn’t trust a laughing unicorn either. Too bad they didn’t have Twitter back then. I would have liked to see what the lady had to say about her portrait-sitting experience. What do you think she would have tweeted?

UPDATED TO ADD: Thanks to my commenters who reminded me of the tiny unicorn’s cousin, the tiny giraffe in the DirecTV “Opulence. I has it” commercial!

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  3. @raphael thanks for the baby unicorn, and all I got you was the plague. your welcome. btw you are getting a bill from my dry cleaner. peace out.

  6. You crack me up! That unicorn is scary. Forget potty training I would be afraid of it gouging me to death with it’s horn as it laughs maniacally.

    Her Tweet: FU @Renaissance_Raphael! My 1 shot at immortality & its with a #f’ing_unicorn? How bout u take the horn & shove it where the sun don’t shine. I’m sending u my dry cleaning bill.

  7. really such a beautiful picture, the unicorn detail is very cute and suprising! Does anybody know what the unicorn symbolizes (in a religious way)?

    xx viviane
    hippiebohoreloaded

    • Based on my wikipedia research, so take it for what its worth, the unicorn was a Medieval symbol of purity that according to lore was only tamable by a virgin. In religious references this virgin is the Virgin Mary and the unicorn is Christ. I’m not sure how that really makes sense as I don’t recall Christ being a wild child who could only be controlled by his mother.

      Given it’s prominent horn I wonder if the unicorn might also represent, tongue in cheek, the mythical virile man who is tamed only by marriage to a chaste young maiden. My thought being that if you’re gonna convince a girl to wear a chastity belt you’ve gotta give her good reason to lock up the goodies.

  9. Hi my dear-its a truly awesome picture, I think she may be wondering if she can keep her gorgeous necklace after the portrait sitting??

  10. I don’t think that unicorn is laughing, in fact I don’t think it’s a unicorn,it looks like a sheep in a fancy hat to me and an angry one at that. xxx

  15. That’s what Monica L. said. (kidding)

    Um, yes, that is a great painting. I picture her as tweeting, ‘Parents R aNgry the bkgrnd rainbow team is late’ ‘Kbye’

  17. Would the unicorn tweet:
    Hurry up before I drop a deuce in this bitchs lap!
    Or would that not be very ladylike?
    Would the unicorn tweet with its horn?

  18. That unicorn is mighty suspicious… I imagine she is looking at a large fishtank, containing a baby narwhal with no horn, with a saw and jar of glue sitting on the table next to it…

  23. Hey, my spam word was dejapseu :-).

    How do you know that isn’t a bleating baby lamb with a penny candy stick stuck on its head?

    She would tweet, OMG! I love my new babeyeak unicorn!

  26. @blondesinglegirl says:
    Do I HAVE to hold this stupid animal?
    @stylistsRUS says:
    Celebs like Parisia della Hilton have to make do with a kinkajou; there are hardly any heiresses left nowadays who can hold a unicorn without everyone cracking up; trust me, you have marketing edge.
    @signiorblondesinglegirl says:
    where’s the rest of the jewellery I bought? how is she supposed to get a first class husband dressed like that?
    @topdrawerhusbands says:
    How is she supposed to get a decent husband dressed like a wannabe? Trust me, this look has cut-through.
    @signiorblondesinglegirl says:
    Raphael, I think you’ve shrunk that pendant, it cost me a fortune, can’t you enlarge it a bit?
    @RaphaelThePainter says:
    I’ve put it slap in the centre of the frame, where no-one can miss it; remember too much paintshopping will undercut your brand. Trust me, the single guys will go gaga over this.
    @singleblondegirl says:
    Raphael, could you at least take the frizz out of my hair!!!

  27. Wendy, you have made my day! My Mum & I saw this in a gallery in Italy – either Florence or Rome I think – and I made her laugh by making silly voices for both the delightful (mangy,no way!) unicorn and his mistress. In fact, so much so that we were glared at by the gallery staff member. Oh dear.

    As I remember it, it was Lady: ‘This? I got a fucking unicorn as a gift?!’
    Unicorn: ‘oh lovely lady, so lucky I am, ha ha’ etc etc

    We had to buy the postcard, our stomachs hurt so much.

    *have* to send this to my mum now…

  30. off to read the comments but am I the only one who watched the new series “The Borgias” yesterday? According to Mr. Google, the lady in the painting is Giulia Farnese,lover to Alexander Borgia and friend to Lucrezia Borgia, so I thought of you and your poison ring!
    In the series yesterday, Giulia is being painted with a small goat in her arms,and the painter says that it will become a unicorn later 🙂

    • I saw it! The bit about by Lucrezia wanting to hold a seahorse the way Giulia has a goat/unicorn was cute. It was a nice touch to have them recreate a real painting, although there’s no actual painting of Lucrezia by Rapahel.

      Also, I love that my catcha is “vampbill.”