Life — October 2, 1919 — page 18: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This satirical cartoon, signed by Warren de Marés, depicts an elegant social gathering where a woman poses a philosophical question to a doctor about maintaining youth through imagination. His response delivers the joke: keeping imagination alive is hard "when so little is left to it"—a sarcastic comment on the woman's revealing dress and exposed body. The satire targets 1920s social changes, specifically the "modern woman" with her fashionably scanty clothing and liberated social behavior. The cartoon mocks both the woman's vanity about youth and the era's loosening dress codes and social mores. The doctor's quip suggests that when there's little clothing left to imagine, the mystery and youthful allure are diminished—a commentary on how changing fashion standards affected traditional notions of feminine mystique and propriety.