“Many hands, one heart…”
A similar photo of my parents on their wedding day inspired this shot…
I have a bit of a thing for hands. Whether pampered and manicured or weathered and work worn, I think they are beautiful, powerful, often evocative instruments…whether ancient, or not so ancient.
Royal Hands
Relief sculpture of the arachnodactylic (spider-like) hands of an Amarna Period royal
Porter hands
Strong, yet delicate…Strikeback 1.3
Beautiful bronze hands
Detail from the Charioteer of Delphi
Talking Hands
TDOS Press Tour
Working Hands
Detail from “The Boxer”
Kissing Hands
North and South…as if you could forget!
Can those really be marble?! hands
Bernini – Hades and Persephone
Tying Hands
Glamour December 2012
Iconic Hand
Detail of David by Michaelangelo
I don’t really know why…I just like hands…
Ancient Armitage 
MMMMMMM.
Indeed 😀
Love this! I never realized how much I like hands, until now (seriously). Talking hands 🙂
Thanks! It just struck me the other day. And talking hands? There is not shortage of Armitage examples for those 😉
Wonderful post! Thank you!! Hands are one of the first things I notice about a person after their eyes. I’m intrigued by them. I remember distinctly as a school girl being repulsed by a friends hands after noticing that while her fingers were perfectly normal she had really short stubby thumbs. I’m quite ashamed now at my reaction to them, but have never forgotten how they made me feel. I wish I could explain it. Am I weird or what?
You have shown some wonderful examples above and the Bernini one is exquisite. I wonder who the body and/or hand models were? Of course it goes without saying that I *love* Richard’s hands. I think they are beautiful whether in repose or “talking”! Those “kissing hands” just added to the beauty of that wonderful scene. *sigh*
It came together remarkably easily. I don’t think you’re weird…hands can be a big turn on/off – my sister once broke up with someone because he had tiny hands (the fact that he was a giant jerk didn’t help either!)
That whole Bernini piece endlessly astounds me. The only one I don’t love is the David, they have always seemed oddly large to me, but it’s less visible when one can’t see the whole piece.
Richard has almost model male hands I think – strongly masculine, but with visible fine bone structure, long fingers…he could be Bernini’s hand model 🙂
So true – the comparison between the hands on Bernini’s statue and Richards, that is. It’s especially noticeable in the “Tying hands” one I think!
I’m also blown away by how he managed to make cold hard marble look like warm soft flesh! What an amazing gift!
Truly…of course there’s always a trade off. In Bernini’s case, he was oddly obsessed with abduction scenes…
Yes, hands are gorgeous. But they somehow have to fit with the man they belong to. I have seen gorgeous hands on despicable people – and they just crept (creeped?) me out. The Armitage hands are fully in keeping with the Armitage body and soul of course, so all good 🙂
I can totally see that – there is a degree of added malevolence when a beautiful instrument is in the hands of a nasty individual.
Totally so. You just wonder how the hell that can be true… the devil has his hands (sic) in it, maybe?
Perhaps…isn’t there lore that the devil was originally the most beautiful of angels? I suppose it makes some degree of sense that nastiness can exist within beautiful things…we wouldn’t be as tempted if it was all ugly…
Oh my yes. I have always had a thing for beautiful hands, and his are a fine example.
I did not have to look very hard at all for some gorgeous hands 🙂
It was a hardship, I’m sure. 😉
Oh, it always is! 😀
The Bernini is incredible. Looks. so. real.
I have really long fingers, and love graceful feminine hands maybe more than those rock-solid (marble-solid?) masculine hands that can do oh-so-much.
And I confess that every time I see Daniela Denby-Ashe’s hands in N&S, I wish she had had pretty, slender fingers. Her hands aren’t the enticing, delicate symbols of feminine allure that Gaskell described. IMO, they’re not really pretty hands at all. 😦
(She makes up for that deficiency in those pouting, sensual lips and doe-like eyes!)
I have lips very like DDA’s. I find the thought very distracting when I think of the interview where Richard says that filming the train station scene was very easy for him because she has lips that he just wanted to kiss as soon as he saw them.
I always have to look twice at images of that Bernini to make sure it’s not a black and white human re-enactment. It really is incredible.
I can see what you mean…that tea pouring scene that Gaskell describes so beautifully doesn’t translate very convincingly for me…Thornton (RA) is seemingly riveted, but why was less clear to me on film…if I hadn’t read Gaskell’s scene, I would have been perplexed.