Real-Life X-Files: Investigating the Paranormal

43. Watching the Spirits Paint

~ Chapter 43 In addition to the Campbell"brothers" (the subject ofthe previous chapter ), the other major spiritualists whose mediumship produced "spirit" paintings were the Bangs sisters of Chicago. Sitters watched portraits of their deceased loved ones gradually appear before their eyes. Misses Elizabeth S. and May E. Bangs were reportedly mediums since childhood, but their "gift" of spirit painting did not appear until the fall of 1894 (Chesterfield 1986). They offered clairvoyance, seance trumpet effects and spirit "materializations," "direct" (or so-called automatic) writing, spirit typewriting, and slate effects. But they were most famous for their allegedly ghost-rendered paintings. Their business card advertised , "Life Sized Spirit Portraits a Specialty" ("Bangs Sisters" n.d.; Swann 1969). Indeed, they appear to have made something of a racket of it, as indicated by an Associated Press story of 1908. A woman who alleged to be the wife of a Chicago millionaire accused May Bangs of enticing him into a bigamous relationship, the man having been, it was claimed, "inveigled into the marriage through the instrumentality of a 'spirit portrait ' ofhis dead mother"-produced by the Bangs sisters ("Spirit" 1908). The Bangses were exposed as tricksters many times. For example, a minister, the Reverend Stanley L. Krebs (1901) sat for one demonstration that involved producing a "spirit" reply to a multipaged letter that he had been instructed to bring, sealed in an envelope. At the beginning of the seance, it was placed between two bound slates. Careful observation , and the use of a small mirror that permitted viewing under the table, allowed Krebs to see how the bound slates were secretly wedged apart and the envelope dropped into Miss Bangs's lap, from whence it 268 ifr Real-Life X-Files was transferred to a tray on the floor and drawn under a closed door. In time, after her accomplice/sister had done her work of steaming open the envelope and penning a reply, the seemingly impossible effect was completed. The sisters used a variety oftechniques for their spirit portraits. Typically , for reasons skeptics may well imagine, "their method was to have the sitter bring a photograph of the dead person to be painted, and the following day the spirits would paint the portrait" (Mulholland 1938, 158). For one-day service, the photograph was reportedly "concealed" from the sisters' view (Swann 1969,4), but they may have gotten access to it in much the same way as they did the previously described letter. According to a booklet published at the Indiana spiritualist colony Camp Chesterfield (where the Bangses had a cottage for a number of years), the sisters' earliest work involved "a locked cabinet or curtained off space" and "several 'sittings' were necessary." Later, the "canvas" (actuallya paper-mounted panel) was placed before a window with light streaming through, and the sitter watched the picture progress over a period of up to forty minutes or so. Still later, the sisters were able to produce artworks in "as little as five minutes" (Swann 1969,3). Reportedly, the Bangs sisters' portraits were examined by unnamed "art experts" who concluded they were not done in any known artistic medium. Rather, the colored substance "could be compared to the dust on a butterflys [sic] wings" (Swann 1969,3). That is, the particulate matter resembled pollen and would thus seem consistent with a pastel"painting " (i.e. a drawing done in pastel crayons, which consist of pigment mixed with gum). In fact, at Lily Dale, where the sisters resided for many seasons, I was able to examine two of their "spirit" portraits, which were framed and mounted under glass (as would be expected for certain media, like watercolors or pastels, but not others-for example, oils). I used an illuminated lOX loupe for the inspection. Having myselfdone portraits in oils, pastels, watercolors, and numerous other media, I sawvery familiar characteristics that I could not distinguish from ordinary pastel renderings (Woolwich 1996), including layering and blending of colors and even unmistakable crayon strokes (as in the hair). (See figure 43.1). Indeed, although claiming that for some pictures the spirits under the Bangses' mediumship furnished "their own colouring matter," one contemporary source stated that "for the usual portraiture, coloured French pastels are Watching the Spirits Paint Figure 43.1. A Iypical "spiril" pori rail produced by Ihe Bangs sisters. placed in front of the canvas and these are used by the spirit artists-by a process called...