“I’ve never had a vicious Angora.”
April 8, 2015 1:48 PM   Subscribe

The Cuddly, Fluffy, Surreal World of Angora Show Bunnies [New York Times]
With beguiling beauty — and an arduous hair-care regimen — these rabbits compete to reach the height of perfection.
posted by Fizz (29 comments total) 17 users marked this as a favorite
 
Ok but the most important part is that the photographer of this bunny fashion show is Andres Serrano.
posted by poffin boffin at 1:49 PM on April 8, 2015 [20 favorites]


nb no bunnies were peed on during this shoot
posted by poffin boffin at 1:50 PM on April 8, 2015 [6 favorites]


“They’re generally a pretty mellow rabbit,” says one Angora fancier.

"Angora fancier" - Greatest business card title ever.
posted by Fizz at 1:54 PM on April 8, 2015 [4 favorites]


With every picture I flipped through I heard the kill...me... voice.
posted by Karaage at 1:59 PM on April 8, 2015 [3 favorites]




“They’re generally a pretty mellow rabbit,” says one Angora fancier. I heard about one that supposedly fell out of its cage overnight, landed on the back of a dog and stayed there until morning.

Shit, never mind about the rabbit.
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:03 PM on April 8, 2015 [17 favorites]


Also, considering all the horrible news happening lately. We needed a hoppy bunny related news story.
posted by Fizz at 2:13 PM on April 8, 2015 [4 favorites]


After the National Angora Show, Hastings went online and looked up the artist who’d spent the day quietly making rabbit portraits in a corner of the barn. She was not prepared for what she discovered. “It doesn’t bother me,” she explains, “but a lot of his work is very . . . avant-garde, is what you would call it.”
posted by Chrysostom at 2:13 PM on April 8, 2015 [19 favorites]


So these are the first stop on the way to tribbles, right?
posted by InfidelZombie at 2:22 PM on April 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


So, are these things just like lap pets that don't move? Or, like other rabbits, are they hopping around having a poo and a hump?
posted by dios at 2:32 PM on April 8, 2015


Don't forget to take the quiz: Which Andres Serrano Bunny Are You?
You are Terri's Prince Charming, a ruby-eyed white English Angora and a pragmatist who takes power imbalances into account rather than blindly attempting to enforce universal moral claims.
posted by Kabanos at 2:33 PM on April 8, 2015 [6 favorites]


Guess who else liked angora rabbits?
posted by lagomorphius at 2:35 PM on April 8, 2015 [3 favorites]


My favorite part is where they eat the ones who don't work out. We need this instituted at Westminster.
posted by nevercalm at 2:43 PM on April 8, 2015 [5 favorites]




the Angoras, too, are essentially regarded as livestock; most fanciers harvest their wool several times a year, and many eat their inferior animals. “They make good barbecue,” Hastings said. (She once took a pot of rabbit stew to a rabbit show, and her husband walked around calling it “loser stew.”)

I like these people.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:54 PM on April 8, 2015 [16 favorites]


We need this instituted at Westminster.

Hell, we need this instituted for Presidential elections!
posted by Pallas Athena at 3:02 PM on April 8, 2015 [6 favorites]


poffin boffin: "Ok but the most important part is that the photographer of this bunny fashion show is Andres Serrano."

Yeah, (Piss) Christ, talk about burying the lede. Although, shock value of some of his works aside, Andres Serrano is a great portrait photographer, and the shots in the slideshow are exactly the same lush, saturated, hyperreal style as his portraits of people. He's not as stylized and over the top as, say, LaChapelle, but he's got a bit of the same aesthetic.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 3:08 PM on April 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


Yeah, (Piss) Christ, talk about burying the lede.

Ha! I didn't even realize it was the same artist. Oops. I was too focused on the awesomeness of those bunnies.
posted by Fizz at 3:29 PM on April 8, 2015 [2 favorites]


This is my favorite photo in the world: World's Fluffiest Bunny
posted by leotrotsky at 3:46 PM on April 8, 2015 [3 favorites]


You occasionally see spinners at fairs that spin the wool right off the rabbit. They only do it to show off to those of us who prefer sheep. Ugh, so smug.
posted by Mary Ellen Carter at 3:49 PM on April 8, 2015 [7 favorites]


I love going to fiber festivals and cooing over the bunnies and llamas and alpacas and sheeps.
posted by Squeak Attack at 4:56 PM on April 8, 2015 [6 favorites]


Here and I always thought Agoraphobia was fear of fluffy bunnies...
posted by sammyo at 5:49 PM on April 8, 2015


Huh, I had no idea the Angoras were so sluggish. I hope it really is just an artifact of being handled all the time and not something like the joint pain which is endemic in Scottish Fold cats. A cursory Google suggests that there aren't any particular genetic diseases recognized in the Angora rabbit breeds, though.

God, angora wool is soft. He's totally right about soft as cotton being a failure--angora yarn feels like clouds look.
posted by sciatrix at 5:50 PM on April 8, 2015


I stared at #7 for a full minute trying to decide if I was looking at a face or a butt.
posted by echocollate at 6:36 PM on April 8, 2015 [3 favorites]


Buried lede, or punchline? That was a doozy.
posted by gusandrews at 8:17 PM on April 8, 2015


"You occasionally see spinners at fairs that spin the wool right off the rabbit."

Angora: the rabbit so furry it literally DOESN'T NOTICE IN THE SLIGHTEST when you pull its fur off.

I would kind of like to try this spinning, actually.

I would like to point out that Betty Chu's world's fuzziest rabbit seems to be the inspiration for author Jayne Castle's "dust bunnies," which are a small but intelligent, four-eyed predatory alien race who love adopting humans and quirky hobbies. I really, really wish I could own a dust bunny for realz. (And frankly, the dust bunnies are by far the best and most interesting characters in the series.)
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:01 PM on April 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


The rabbit in the third photo has a Lorax face.

It speaks for the trees for the trees have no tongues
Oh by the way it is also a bun.

posted by BiggerJ at 11:59 PM on April 8, 2015 [3 favorites]


Sheared angora rabbit. There's not much left.
posted by Kabanos at 10:32 AM on April 9, 2015


Abon Sapi: "I heat and insulate my house with stacks of these things."

Well, they do give off a fair bit of heat when burned, but they're hardly cost-efficient fuel.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 3:40 AM on April 11, 2015


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