{"id":132274,"date":"2018-12-27T13:00:39","date_gmt":"2018-12-27T18:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=132274"},"modified":"2018-12-20T13:25:43","modified_gmt":"2018-12-20T18:25:43","slug":"selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Selika, Mystery of the Belle Epoque"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>We\u2019re away until January 2, but we\u2019re reposting some of our favorite pieces from 2018. Enjoy your holiday!<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-121390\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"766\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian.jpg 550w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian-215x300.jpg 215w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Selika Lazevski exists in six black-and-white photographs and nowhere else. I first saw her when those six studio portraits appeared on Tumblr in 2012. They quickly spread around the Internet as readers asked, Who is she? But although I\u2019ve searched for years, every pin I place to try to map the real woman snaps and slides out of place, multiplying new leads that take me nowhere. I wrote a blog post about her name, guessed the wrong photographer, and saw my error replicate around the Internet, too, even turning up in the publicity materials for a short film about Selika. This much I do know: she was a black <em>amazone<\/em> in Belle Epoque Paris, a city where black \u201cAmazons\u201d were shown in a human zoo; she was a celebrity who left no other trace than these six tokens of her celebrity; she was a horsewoman without a horse, a power hinted at but not granted.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/02\/09\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read more &gt;&gt;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Selika Lazevski exists in six photographs and nowhere else. She was a black Amazon in Belle Epoque Paris, a horsewoman without a horse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1392,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44292],"tags":[32878,10821,32880,32875,32876,32884,17759,32877,32881,32883,30934,32879,32882],"class_list":["post-132274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-best-of-2018","tag-archives-de-paris","tag-belle-epoque","tag-equestrians","tag-giacomo-meyerbeer","tag-lafricaine","tag-la-cravache","tag-manet","tag-rafael-padilla","tag-selika","tag-tissot","tag-toulouse-lautrec","tag-vasco-de-gama","tag-xenophons-on-horsemanship"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Selika, Mystery of the Belle Epoque<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Selika Lazevski exists in six photographs and nowhere else. 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She was a black Amazon in Belle Epoque Paris, a horsewoman without a horse.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-12-27T18:00:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"550\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"766\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Susanna Forrest\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Susanna Forrest\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Susanna Forrest\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6e32727cc9c3bb115a996be4fe028a6c\"},\"headline\":\"Selika, Mystery of the Belle Epoque\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-12-27T18:00:39+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/\"},\"wordCount\":183,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Archives de Paris\",\"Belle \u00c9poque\",\"Equestrians\",\"Giacomo Meyerbeer\",\"L'Africaine\",\"La Cravache\",\"Manet\",\"Rafael Padilla\",\"Selika\",\"Tissot\",\"Toulouse Lautrec\",\"Vasco de Gama\",\"Xenophon's On Horsemanship\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Best of 2018\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/\",\"name\":\"Selika, Mystery of the Belle Epoque\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/27\/selika-lost-mystery-belle-epoque-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/african-american-female-equestrian.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-12-27T18:00:39+00:00\",\"description\":\"Selika Lazevski exists in six photographs and nowhere else. 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