Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Tenniel's Caterpillar

Tenniel's Caterpillar

Original - Sir John Tenniel's illustration of the Caterpillar for Lewis Carroll's classic children's book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. The illustration is noted for its ambiguous central figure, which can be viewed as having either a human male's face with pointed nose and protruding lower lip or as the head end of an actual caterpillar, with the right three "true" legs visible. The small symbol in the lower left is composed of Tenniel's initials, which was how he signed most of his work for the book. The partially obscured word in the lower left-center is the last name of Edward Dalziel, the engraver of the piece.

Reason

Sir John Tenniel was one of the most popular illustrators in 19th century England and his most famous works today are his illustrations for Lewis Carroll's Alice series. This picture of the Caterpillar is noted for its ambiguous central figure, which can be viewed as having either a human male's face with pointed nose and protruding lower lip or as the head end of an actual caterpillar, with the right three "true" legs visible.

Articles this image appears in

John Tenniel, Hookah, Caterpillar (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland), Ambiguity

Creator

Sir John Tenniel, uploaded by Liftarn

• Support as nominator Matt Deres (talk) 03:13, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose I think we could find (or scan, since many of us have the books) another of Tenniel's illustrations that would be much better - here, we see only the eyes of Alice, and the back of the 'pillar! --Janke | Talk 17:31, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment This is the only illustration Tenniel did of the Caterpillar. Thinking about it now, a second illustration would likely destroy the carefully crafted ambiguity of this picture. Matt Deres (talk) 17:53, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

This is arguably Tenniel's most famous illustration. Indeed, I imagine many people would consider it one of the most famous book illustrations of all time. Kaldari (talk) 00:36, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

• Comment Support - I would like to support this nomination except I can't understand why this is saved as a JPEG. Black and white illustrations such as this should be saved as GIF or PNG files. Kaldari (talk) 00:36, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Info The short reason why it's a JPG is because that's the way it was scanned in by the uploader. The longer explanation is that GIF files are supposed to be used for animation only and I wasn't sure a 50% file savings was worth the bother of uploading a PNG image; I'm not even certain of how I'd supersede the JPG version smoothly. I'm not sure why that's even an issue (the picture isn't going to get any better), but if someone can point me to a tutorial, I'll do the work. Future voters please note that the image is not intended to illustrate Alice, but to illustrate Tenniel's work (and the Caterpillar, of course). I wouldn't be opposed to nominating more of his pictures, but this is a good scan and one of his more interesting pieces of work. Matt Deres (talk) 20:13, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
    • It's unfortunate the person who scanned the image chose to save it as a JPEG, but as you say, the image "isn't going to get any better". Oh well. Kaldari (talk) 23:57, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

*Comment Conceded, this is iconic for inclusion in Caterpillar, but my oppose still stands, also per above. (I'd prefer Alice at the tea party, or coming through the looking glass, but that's not for the 'pillar article...) --Janke | Talk 07:16, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

• • Changing to Support, now when it is also in ambiguity. --Janke | Talk 16:39, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
• Support I think this is a clever and interesting image. It adds interest to the article on ambiguity and is also great for the caterpillar article. Mangostar (talk) 23:35, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
• Support nice illustration of a well known and encyclopedic subject Thisglad (talk) 08:49, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Promoted Image:Alice 05a-1116x1492.jpg --jjron (talk) 08:19, 26 April 2008 (UTC)