20s | Introvert | She/Her | Haladriel and Saurondriel occupy my brain’s CPU | AO3 authors of Haladriel/Saurondriel are absolute gods 🙌✨ | I stop by here to feed my madness and enjoy some fun — memes, gifs, and all that 🙃
I say to you, Frodo, that even as I speak to you, I perceive the Dark Lord and know his mind, or all of his mind that concerns the Elves. And he gropes ever to see me and my thought.
Morfydd Clark | “Building Middle-Earth”
Behind the scenes on costume, hair and make-up.
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Theory: How the Darmstadt Madonna Painting & Young Galadriel’s Valinor Dress Foretell Her Redemption Arc
Long story short, while writing other adjacent Galadriel meta, I randomly found this: the Darmstadt Madonna (scroll down).
A 16th century painting of an aristocratic couple humbled before the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus. And I saw dots begging for connection.
I think the wife, Magdalena Baer, was the inspiration for young Galadriel's dress, as it's strikingly similar (see collage below).
Combined with Tolkien's parallels between the last version of Galadriel and St. Mary.
Plus Magdalena Baer's positioning to St. Mary in the painting is too-coincidental-to-ignore.
Moreover, the RoP costume designer has similar precedence with Queen Regent Miriel.
(Top right) Magdalena Baer
Similar dress style and signifiers
Although Magdalena’s dress is more sophisticated than Galadriel's in construction, both are voluminous (likely) white linen and embellished with blackwork — historically emblematic of their high status, as fine embroidery takes time and skill.
Here’s where they differ: the sheerness of Galadriel’s dress means it’s in fact an early medieval-styled (slim-sleeved) chemise — a garment to be worn under a top layer (see images below).
Apparently appropriate for an Elf child but tad bit risqué for an adult she-Elf. And in contrast, Magdalena’s blackwork is adorning the top layer.
Galadriel’s white chemise motif
She wears one as a child,
when leaping into the seas,
and within Sauron's freaky little dream sequence.
Each time when darkness is literally and metaphorically before her.
In the opening montage, an adult Galadriel still wears the chemise of her youth, as she struggles to process comprehend "paradise lost."
In costume design, white can hold many many meanings: purity, equality, and new beginnings.
Purity in the innocence of childhood —and by extension — of the Eldar before Morgoth’s unchaining.
Equality perhaps when Pharazon mocks her alleged illustrious titles while wearing a plain chemise. Lack of status-signaling adornment commutes to visual peasantry. A potential beginnings each time she faces Sauron’s proposal / these crossroads.
@klynnvakarian or @penelopeloveshere, have anything to add from a Mormon perspective? I know white robes hold meaning.
Magdalena is positioned close to Virgin Mary — like Galadriel in Tolkien’s view
Galadriel isn’t strictly speaking an analogy for the Blessed Virgin… but she shares a number of characteristics with Mary. Tolkien considered her the “greatest of elven women,” in the same way we might consider Mary to be the greatest of all saints. She is a queen, a mother, and often appears as a miraculous helper. Sometimes, she is referred to simply referred to as, “The Lady of Light.“ — How J.R.R. Tolkien spoke about the beauty of Mary
Mere coincidence?
Paintings like the Darmstadt Madonna would take months+ to complete. As such, the painter's daughter— a long, golden haired adolescent like young Galadriel — was a stand-in for Magdalena Baer.
RoP’s costume designer has precedence with Miriel
Miriel’s costumes are based on the famous painting Zenobia. Like Miriel, she was a powerful woman acting on behalf of her father. Zenobia was usurped by Emperor Aurelian (“the Golden”) whereas Miriel face the same by Pharazôn (“the Golden”).
Thank you for reading! Likes and tagged reblogs are appreciated. Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments or DM.
Galadriel’s Face Here Isn’t Demonic — It’s ECSTASY
Demonic. That’s one of top ways I’ve seen her face is described in forums and comment sections. It is an unfortunate shot.
But when compared to the 50 shades to scowl she displays in the show, this is a look not demonic possession but of pure ecstasy.
Galadriel is a self-implied “horse girl.”Most people aren’t aware — and “horse girls” are — that women can orgasm from horseback riding. Based on that, I’ll discuss two alternative takes of her expression.
Galadriel is experiencing sadistic sexual arousal
Not far-fetched. The top traits of revenge-seeking people are 1) narcissism 2) neuroticism and 3) sadism.
Interestingly, the only other time she smiles showing teeth is when Elrond lists off her titles earned from centuries of slaughter and glory.
Note the clear pleasure she displays while describing to Adar her plans to exterminate the homeless orcish peoples before himself — totally aware he was a former Elf kidnapped, enslaved, and tortured into a new race to mock God then likely forced to breed like chattel.
She thinks of the humiliation, pain and/or suffering as she and Elendil gallop closer to her goal: bloodlust.
Galadriel is fantasying about Halbron
And this is the reason her whole demeanor perked up when Elendil mentioned horseback riding. A discretely exhibitionistic occasion to have a warm-blooded muscular creature between her thighs —its like she has not felt since Celeborn went missing.
Especially given the sexual tension between her and the Low Man. Perhaps a tension from the days before when Halbron returned her dagger, and for a split second, (head canon tells me) she thought it was something else.
I think it’d be both. She’s getting off fantasying about straddling Halbron after they’ve both eradicate orcs from Middle-Earth.
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