Hang on to your pumps, collectors!

Collectors and historians alike will be pleased to know that “Bild” Lilli, besides the usual dolls, variations, the magic trick ironically called The Disappearing Doll and the trapeze swing for the rear-view mirror of cars and her extensive wardrobe there existed other accessories. There was a fabulous poster drawn by the famous cartoonist who invented Lilli, a chair (very Eames-style in vinyl as well as a now design classic, the archtypical Ferrari Hardoy “Butterfly” chair as well), a what is known as a Hitchin’ Lilli which was a solid moulded Lilli with her thumb posed in a hitch-hiking position and attached to a rod on a suction cup to put in the back of cars as well, and a number of other now nearly impossible to locate accessories. There was never a police officer doll or revolver made for the Lilli...hélas. Imagine the Series Noires possibilities that may have existed if they had.

There was a lipstick red vinyl case made by the 3M (Maar) company for their Lilli doll too. It is quite rare to find today and a fabulous anecdote since in Hamburg, where prostitutes display their assets by sitting in windows, this vinyl case imitates such custom with it’s own vinyl window to display Lilli. A number of colour catalogues, a cartoon book, even material on the film, based on Lilli the doll and made in the fifties in Germany exists as well.

The variety and humour of the various wardrobes made for all these Lilli doll incarnations is an ever-intriguing challenge with endless discoveries and these prospects can motivate a collector for practically a lifetime.

AND hang on to your pumps...there are black Hong Kong Lillis, at least in prototype form, and apparently black German Bild Lilli dolls as well as one know seven inch Hong Kong version which was made and sold......it boggles the mind!

In summary, these Lilli dolls and variation dolls are important to study as they run the full gamut of this transitional period in both society and fashion as well as doll tendencies. They reflect, both by quality and concept, the teenage aspirations and the trends of the late fifties and early sixties, a turning point for western culture.

Collectors of Barbie dolls usually scorn these dolls. It’s rather unfortunate and short-sighted. However, very recently some collectors have started to acknowledge the interest of the German "Bild" Lilli doll, a 1980s auction selling one to the highest bidder for $350. Now, the first “Bild” Lilli, correctly dressed and in excellent condition with tube and journal can sell for thousands of dollars. While some examples of "Bild" Lilli, such as a mint, pristine 1955 first example, complete with her introductory first issue of the miniature Bild Zeitung newspaper, has sold for a considerably higher price, others are still within reason and certainly worth buying.

Relatively few collectors exist but Lillis from Germany have a considerably cult value status of late, since over the last few years, has been featured in many museum shows and studies and appearing in various books, some of which have gotten the facts wrong. These dolls have become practically mythic as they were a great innovation for dolls at the time. I was the first author to extensively write about “Bild” Lilli in my book, Barbie, Her Life and Times (Crown Publishers, New York).

While German Lilli is of a very high quality, as are the Miss Seventeen outfits, (they truly can be called “designer” fashions considering who designed them!) the general ilk is very poorly made, at best mediocre, so don’t be shocked by seams showing and a pinched make-up look due to hasty painting by Hong Kong factory workers. Yet, for example, even though Marx Toys Miss Marlene from Japan, the first Fab-Lu Ltd Babs and her wardrobe and Ottolini's Ellen are of a very excellent manufacture, most of these dolls are of particularly lower end quality but it does not mean that these dolls are without interest. The doll race (maybe its called the Bildus Liilium race, like we are of the human Homo Erectus race), as Lilli in any incarnation is, has a special allure which is practically poetic. The painted Hong Kong Lilli’s found in Germany and Austria are of particular interest and are as rare as the original German-made Lilli. The entire “genre” is very poignant - retrospectively speaking.

For all of these dolls, their social message and their materials from the era make them worthy of collection. I feel any Barbie doll collection, or for that matter any fashion doll collection of the twentieth-century, should have at least a few examples of each of these glamorous dolls, not only to show the Barbie doll origins but more importantly this glamorous, hard-edged period when women were commonly portrayed as sexy, men-snaring, and aggressive sex objects. As it was a relatively brief period, these dolls very poignantly portray this western trend and rather perfectly imitate the real world of popular culture as well as fashion for the middle-classes. Their dreams and values, such as marriage, wealth, and seduction, were exactingly shown and taught to little girls.

These dolls are no longer easy to find, even on eBay, though they are not relatively speaking rare. However, they now have a cult around them that equals anything that can be considered rare compared to the avalanche of available Barbie dolls. More than any collectible Barbie doll, Liill anything, doll, ceramic wallhead or clothing is more scarce naturally since they existed for a much shorter period and in lesser quantities for which often, these ephemeral things were often were eventually destroyed or relegated to attics and boxes of junk in any storage area in a home. This said, especially since internet, with diligent searching they can be found and collected. Emphasizing that they are not rare, you can manage to find all of these dolls with patience as on eBay at any given time you can find some. Out of box, some of them would be difficult to identify as well as the clothing and accessories since many of the Hong Kong accessories were used by a number of different second and third rate doll companies. (see below)

Mint-in-box clothes, they can be un-boxed and put on dolls for display without any risk of destroying any important elements of the “collectibility." While I recommend keeping the packaging, I feel it is incidental whether or not the doll is kept inside the boxes. Most likely for relatively little money and effort you can find several examples and opt to save one in the box if you are so concerned with posterity. A very fun book, written by Silke Knaak, called Deutsche Modepuppen der 50er + 60er - German Fashion Dolls of the 50's + 60's shows some of these dolls as well as many Lilli costumes and dolls. It is well worth reading, as it's written obviously with a collector in mind and by a passionate collector herself, Ms. Silke Knaak, with a fabulous and rather completely illustrated collection. You can find this book on easily on eBay and I highly recommend it.

One thing is outstanding about this entire subject and genre of fashion dolls. Bild Lilli was the matrix doll which defined the era of fashion dolls. It was Rolf Hausser's toy company and his refined personal vision of Reinhard Beüthien's cartoon which made the doll become the icon which she is today. Oddly though, through devious deals, outright copyright and patent thefts, abusive licensees and licensors, underhanded theft of design and fabrication of the dolls and clothes and packaging as well as the original illustrations that the original thief, which made Barbie, ended up quite undeservingly became Barbie, one of the most, if not the most popular doll in the world. Bear in mind, these thefts and scandals of that time were not over artist integrity. It was ALL about making money.

So if we can achieve one slogan for this phenomenon it could be "Clones Equals Theft"!

This is the case back then and the case now. In some odd way, by endorsing the original creation of these sub-Lilli dolls we are inadvertently endorsing theft. It was theft that bankrupted Rolf Hausser and that is why, his mythical Bild Lilli is extremely harder to find as once before. Just a decade or two ago the first Bild Lilli out there in the world were only the original ones made in extremely small amounts. Had Herr Hausser not been broken by the life long lawsuits and if he'd not been ripped off by Mattel, maybe his heirs would still be making these glamorous dolls today. Max Weissbrodt designed the prototype of the doll for the O&M Hausser company, (Elastolin is a trademark used by the German company O&M Hausser (O&M Haußer) which was on sale from 1955 to 1964, when Mattel claimed to acquire the rights to the doll and German production stopped. Until then production numbers reached about 130,000 in official records.

Another factor to consider is the glorification by today's collectors of these clones, which in my opinion is also rather dubious. While yes, the dolls themselves in any incarnation captured in the 2000s a then-current zeitgeist, probably largely due to the success of my work on Barbie in the 1970s and 80s along with my best-selling book "Barbie, Her Life and Times (Crown Publishers, New York) and my not really intentional though clear invention of what is now called the "fashion doll make-over", the prolific over flow of fashion dolls, keep this kind of thievery acceptable. Just look at the Mattel and Bratz dolls which ended up costing Mattel, by losing as of 2012 the on-going court cases, according to official sources over 310 million dollars in damages to MGA Entertainment the creators of Bratz dolls. In August 2012, MGA and Mattel's dispute had ended with MGA walking away the victors. Mattel was ordered to pay $310 million to MGA for damages. Isaac Larian said that the Bratz brand was damaged by an estimated $1 billion, due to Mattel's lawsuit and that MGA intends to recoup the losses in a separate and pending lawsuit against Mattel.

Independantly other factors have made theft of copyright a socially acceptable meme amongst not only among huge companies but just home grown collectors. The invention and usage of the internet that every body feels they are a creator, making endless, endless masses of one-of-a-kind (more easily written as ooak,  which sounds if pronounced like some strange extinct Australian bird) dolls, many of which can be lovely though most are made to be put directly into the trash. Collectors now "create" new dolls from old dolls, mould and transform one doll to look like another, a popular one being taking a Barbie or a Barbie copy, or some other doll in the genre and making them look like a Bild Lilli. 

The actual Bild Lilli doll herself was moulded by an obsessively ambitious British man and renamed several things including Lola and Lalka, and sold as a reproduction, though not authorized to my knowledge since the patent is not clearly defined as to who owns it now, but this counterfeit was impeccably done using today's much more sophisticated manufacturing abilities in China. If it were not for the fact the maker is occasionally clear that it is a new doll, it still can  cause serious confusion due to it's stunning authenticity compared to the original. The clothes, made in China, are constructed almost as identically as the doll herself and are probably the best imitation of a doll I've personal ever seen. Usually I despise remakes authorized by previous makers, the Robert Tonner Company copies of Revlons, Betsey McCalls and other dolls I find, personally, appalling, unnecessary and a huge and rather decadent waste of petroleum in a time when such waste is a serious environmental concern. Yes, one can argue, that these new Lalkas are made in China, (something I seriously frown upon for everything and anything) and use the same petroleum products, but in it's defense, it was a extremely limited run and the result is a foray into decorative art. I think it's very poignant that inadverantly became a way to backhandedly pay homage to Rolf Hausser, the gentleman I knew as a teen who created a generation of aesthetic dolls close to works of art.

Actually to some it can be argued that the original Bild Lilli is a work of art. This new reproduction is a nice piece of decorative applied art but not, in my opinion a work of completely original art as was the original. The fact that it is a fake casts a shadow on it's result. I cannot condone stealing as this is sadly what this new doll is...a theft. It is a line-for-line copy. It falls into the realm of things like a newly made Eames chair or an Alvar Aalto vase but without the blessings of the owner of the intellectual property rights. Same aesthetic interest, no history interest yet, its a copy. However, it's made with a great deal of obsession. Its a whole other way of looking at Bild Lilli by a fan, a doll collector. Also, by someone with a great deal of knowledge about underground 1980s British club culture under his belt. Like the genuine Bild Lilli, and as they are unmarked like the real deal Lilli, they will undoubtedly be confused for real ones one day sooner more than later.

This Lola/Lalka is a quirky participant, and a unique entry in the Bild Lilli story though which falls into no category previously explored. The maker of the Lola/Lalka doll Julian Stanley Kalinowski (who uses a variety of other aliases such as Julian Stanislaw-Richard Kalinowski-esquire, Julian de Sade and on the Flickr group, Juliannadesade and other invented names (though he wishes sometimes to remain nameless - because after all, these are unlicensed copies of a doll which is still under ownership by heirs somewhere) has a Dunning Krueger Effect about these dolls. This is the reason why he decided to make these copies, his ability to convince himself it's okay to do so. He was attracted to the hand-painting of the faces, like Sasha dolls and because the real deal is much more costly, made an affordable one for himself and others with the same obsession of Bild Lilli. There is a Flickr group of a bit over 200 fans who collect them and the appeal seems to be able to have a Bild Lilli at the fraction of the price. Though it is unclear why one would want inauthentic though exact copies knowing they are fakes is hard to understand. He did do doll shows throughout Europe when he was selling them. Julian is an acquaintance of mine with a way to make poseur banter and possesses a truly wicked sense of humor, his personal spirit is imbued into the making of these copies of the iconic Bild Lilli. At one point he offered me to handle and contribute to the Lola/Lalka experience and our letters by email and our metaphysical telephone conversations were memorably a true exercise de style of intellectual banter. He attempts to be one of the Alpha collectors and Alpha makers with this particular doll remake though I think the Bild Lilli lore is waning. 

Julian wrote me a note several years ago (April 28th, 2013 to be exact), in fact its one of those dubious compliments, out-of-the-blue that once in a while you get which really leaves one scratching one's head. He fell upon this article again, he's told me, before the moment when he realized how much he liked Bild Lilli. I asked him if I could quote him, as I wanted to add some more information about what he does, especially the names and the inspiration, This is what he said, verbatim:

"Lola was also called Penny Dreadful-or Pretty Penny after Liz's and my fanzine - she was supposed to be a free gift sellotaped to the cover-like those free gifts on 70's comics. It was a joke that ran away with itself. We also called her Lola because it sounded like a German hookers name from a Fassbinder, and of course, the Dietrich connection - because Lilli had also been Lilli Marlene for export. We wanted her to have several names to confuse people, because that was a bad business idea - you get it, I know you do.

Lalka was a 'blank' name we chose - kind of Margiela-ish - you know - a blank label, just 'doll', but in Polish, because, remember I am Polish, not English.(nb: Lalka in Polish means simply "doll") And remember - the legs - they cross - that was a homage to Mdvanii - an improvement invented by you and copied also by Mattel for the Silkstones.

Yes, I'm very happy for you to quote me. And please remember - YOU inspired Lola/Lalka - I always told you that-do you remember? I'm not arse licking you - but that article was so important. It really was a huge inspiration to me and I think credit should always be given where credit is due {you are responsible-ha ha ha}

I have always honoured you - and defended you, on occasion, to fools who know nothing. Ha ha - what was it Trojan (nb: Mythic now deceased Blitz Kid artist, muse, collaborator and mate to artist Leigh Bowery and friend of ours from the 80s) wrote in the lift in Farrell house -'Those beneath us know nothing'

Mind you - I'm a dirty bootlegger..."

Of course, this is very convoluted but, more so, this doll maker has a truly Machiavellic sense of priorities. Clearly his copying Bild Lilli doll is based in obsession for the subject and but also for profit and a bit of the neo-punk 1980s ethos of in-your-face exploitation and disobedience. That's why its a very interesting thing indeed.

Soon, I should update this article shall so it can have an up-date with Lola and Lalka photos. One thing I would like to mention is that when I first saw the Lalkas (second generation Lolas, I think), I noticed his more recent Lalka dolls face paintings bear direct influence of the Sasha doll philosophy of doll face painting - that is to say, hand done by the maker, almost sketched on, like a drawing or painting. Julian also obsesses ovber and used to collect Sasha dolls, like myself as I have already mentioned. The scritchy, hand done touch (as opposed to sleek stylized delineation) is particularly interesting how he made a cross over of the two iconic dolls. The eyebrows in particular are very laboured over and very new to the brow of this genre of doll. This is unique to Julian and which distinguishes his dolls from all the rest and hopefully will also distinguish them from real Bild Lilli dolls. Most interestingly, it takes away the utter hardness of the doll and she somehow has more of a endearing expression of vulnerability and tenderness. I am quite sure he got this from my second generation of Mdvanii doll, my own creation. This transcends the doll entirely and would be very noble if the fact remains Lilli is not his creation and his use of her is theft. Without all the lack of ethics, It makes this generation of Lilli-Lore a whole new character in some sort of way. He has managed to bring himself into the work and isn't that what any one who reproduces some else's work does? It distinguishes simple product from homage and from appropriation art and turns it into an easy grift of the object of desire of a the digital era.

Julian also gave me some very pertinent info which I shall quote here:

"I just should mention this stuff, it's important I think:

Lola/Penny Dreadful/Pretty Penny was very much inspired by Babs and Sylvie, lower quality Hong Kong Lilli's that we found very funny for their trashiness. Her body and arms were copied from a Hong Kong Lilli but with the 'Registered hip joint' of Bild Lilli, as many Hong Kong Lilli's had. Her head sculpt was an entirely unique one, done by an artisan mould maker in China. We {Liz Lee and I, it's important to document that she was my collaborator in this scheme} had travelled out there to liaise with the first factory. (nb: Julian's partner is Elizabeth Lee a.k.a. Painted Doll).

Very few of these first dolls were made, the project was aborted because we were very displeased with the quality. The concept of the doll had never been about quality, only, originally, about 'doing it', but issues arose slowly connected to that {quality issues} as our own personal integrity and curiosity about how 'well done' the doll could be grew.

Therefore Lalka came about. A new factory was sourced and new arms and a new head were sculpted that we were happier with. The ams are once more based on a Hong Kong Lilli's, longer than Bild Lilli's. The hips had been aligned in such a manner on the original doll that the legs would cross, elegantly. This was a conscious nod to Mdvanii and a homage.

The head mould was similar to Bild Lilli's, but with a different construction. But neither Lola or Lalka were ever mould for mould copies of anything. They were both a 'melange' and quite 'accidental'. We were never remotely precious. Our attitude was always 'whatever, just get on with it'.

Lalka was also produced in very limited quantities. Several hundred dolls.

We grew very bored with the doll and both of us wished to move on quickly to new projects-not necessarily doll related, which we did.

Also 'business' issues arose that disturbed us. American dealers mistook us for 'business' people, which we were most certainly not.

'As the dirty stripper who lost her knickers at the bus stop said - 'You don't think I do it for the money, do you'? {Remember that Zef, the very rare Westwood McClaren label - between Sex and Seditionaries? - well, perfect quote}

I, personally, for my own pleasure, made a small run of one off dolls that, as you immediately understood, were very much based around Sasha Morganthaler's studio dolls {conceptually}. Quickly sketched 'drawings on heads'. I did this mainly to improve my own painting and airbrushing skills, as this became my principle interest, briefly."

This is the mind set of a anarchistic neo-punk, not even a doll maker or business man. It has it's own philosophy stemming from, like many people, a nostalgic sadness as they drift away from their youth.

So, yes Julian, I do "get it". I think what Julian has contributed to this doll is, like reality television, and high drama tv series, he has somehow transcended the doll into a new realm of voyeurism and puerile interest. His point of view is certainly rather unique as far as doll makers and collectors are concerned. 

I'd like to know though, if anything, what exactly was the process of doing the moulds, especially for the heads, since clearly they are not new sculpts. If there was a model maker (or mould modifier) involved, clearly it was moulded from an old doll or from re-tooled moulds rather than sculpted from scratch. Even if sculpted by mounding an old doll, you could in the process change or remodel seams, openings and some of the assembly details. I'm not entirely sure I understand what is meant by the head being a "unique one" since when you compare it to the original Darwinian evolutionary trail of Bild Lilli/Hong Kong Lilli heads the Lola/Lalka dolls seem veritably identical. If the head was moulded from an old one, in any case, there would have been minute differences in proportion leaving the resultant head so-to-speak, different and "unique" but it would be very, very imperceptible. Julian mentioned the extension of the arms too. Its difficult to see the difference between a Hong Kong Lilli and a Lola. All of this is incidental because it is of no real importance in the scope of the creators intentions.

Not all people who deal with Bild Lilli and her genre are as transparent and with such flagrant punk attitude as Julian though. Dealers have attempted to make a falsified market for these vintage Bild Lilli family of fashion dolls and what was considered truly worthless junk just less than two decades ago thanks to venues such as eBay, Etsy and Ricardo, internet selling sites where one can find dolls such as Babs and her clothes, Lilli dolls from Hong Kong, Marx, Cragstan, Fab-Lu Ltd. etc etc dolls, the landslide of their cheaply done yet somewhat stylish and evocative of their era clothes and accessories, are attempted to be sold at outrageous prices. Even though by studying those actually sold for the price asked in fact few actually do get sold, the immense greed of selling collectors or professional dealers is egregious and contemptible.

This stuff is NOT rare no matter how hard it can be to buy them at a few thousand dollars a pop...which is partially due to the fact collector's don't sell them that often, they tend to sell only out of need for cash or death. In fact, all these commercially made dolls are everywhere, still in attics, garages and dusty doll rooms of the recently deceased!

The only consolation is the earnest love by naïve doll collectors for these things which justify the deplorable mercantilism which surrounds collecting of anything. Look at all the Flickr groups and billions of sometimes cute or arty photos of endless amounts of these dolls. It is both cheering and depressing. And least we neglect to notice, isn't it ironic that big queens like these queens? The variety of intelligence displayed by the comments you read is the A-Z of the horror of the human experience, especially the middle-class, under-educated, wily for scoring great dolls for nothing cross section of collectors. Makes one cringe. Thanks to the team of Dunning-Krueger, thank you for explaining this phenomena to the world.

Julian recently made a series of these dolls with what he claims is a copy of the French company Caprice's obscure and the new fetish of a part of the doll world. She was a 1960s doll called "Caprice" and that was also used as a celebrity doll briefly when the company started calling her Sylvie after Sylvie Vartan in the late 1960s. Between moulding parts of her, and obviously parts of my own doll Mdvanii as well as Bild Lilli and other tweeks here and there, he has made a FrankenLillistein which is receiving a mild embrace into the flock of these genre of dolls. They are dressed by a bevy of amateur doll clothes makers, all very Mdvanii-looking outfits and also with vintage clone doll clothes which in itself is an invention also of myself though I am fascinated on how it is done now. Sometimes, you come across a stunning image of these doll ghetto doll wannabes.

He sells these dolls with their own built-in personality; inspired by Mdvanii who had a precise personality but in this case the personality is totally fucked up. They are imbued with the backstories of all sorts of slutty, broken women, murderesses, abandoned sluts, complex, sociopath women of ill-repute etc. I personally think the reason gay men are so attracted to these dolls is because they identified with Mdvanii, but she was too morally ethical, too highbrow, too elitist. Plus I made her impossible to get after a while, and that is a story unto itself as many people know. The slutty, dangerous female shown in these stolen intellectual property fakes are perhaps a real reflection of some of it's audience of today. The leftover queens of the 80s and 90s who like Bild Lilli gave way to the newer queens who somehow find interest in a "clinically depressed" sociopath doll, like a reality tv star who vomits on herself or has an abortion or has bipolar disorder. Plus, she comes with a built-in ethically wrong real backstory, she is stolen intellectual property! The gossip amongst these queens is probably thrilling and gives them a reason "to live". Living in the digital age which overflows with gossip and scandal, it makes perfect sense a doll existing who has it's owners busy with their little hands typing snide remarks and exchanging gossip is part of the zeitgeist of now. She has her small niche market like everything today, a mini tribe of fans who are a cluster of the same psychological profile. Reality meets fiction, meets the zeitgeist. It fills a void. No wonder she's depressed and killing other dolls (one presumes). It really is fascinating in that regard. The writing on a blog dedicated to this doll is brilliantly written by his partner Liz, for whom I have great admiration and respect. I think the writing is infinitely more original and merit of acclaim as a genuine original creation than the doll itself. I think the moment has passed since my debut and precedent of the interest of Bild Lilli as a interesting doll to collect in the early 1970s.

I'd be interested to see when the world moves forward from these dolls. The BJD (Ball Joint Dolls from South Korea based partially on my own ball jointed Mademoiselle Mdvanii) phenomenon came and has gone, the Blythe thing is nearly dead.....what shall be the next truly original creation? Silkstone Barbie has attempted to become Mdvanii though with her slutty eyeliner and whorish beauty mark and utterly boring attempt to copy Mdvanii's parisian lifestyle, she is out and out mass-market product more than ever before.

On the purely aesthetic and intellectual side of collecting dolls and also, the fun side, I think that with little effort, one can assemble an interesting collection of these type of original era dolls (from the nineteen fifties and sixties and even seventies) and can, with wit and perseverance, beautifully illustrate a fabulous moment when post-war pin-ups, nearly emancipated hookers, Hollywood starlets, floozies and wannabes, glamour goddesses, sex-appeal, and teenagers were reigning as queens. 

© BillyBoy*,  2000/2012
© BillyBoy*, 2016/2017

Special thanks to Silke Knaak and Sumiko Watanabe.