Long ago, in our distant, pre-Homo erectus past, when we were all just chimpanzees, or whatever chimpanzees were before they were officially chimpanzees, we didn’t have much. Dirt, seeds, nuts, leaves, and rocks. And, if you were a lucky young female chimp, you had a stick—a stick that (says Science) you carried around as if it were a baby, tending to it, cradling it, practicing for the day when some smooth-talking chimp would knock you up outside Rift Valley Middle School. In other words, the stick was a doll, and though it was only a stick, you were happy.
Today, however, we are no longer chimps, and we are no longer satisfied with sticks. Just as we have evolved, so have our dolls: from porcelain dainties to Raggedy Ann to Barbie to Cabbage Patch Kids to Bratz.
And now comes the next stage in dollular progress: A Canadian artist named Kim Hunter will make you a doll whose face is taken from a photo you send. In other words, you can have a doll that looks just like you, or your kid, or, I don’t know, Martin Short. Imagine having your daughter cradle, love, and drag around a handcrafted poppet THAT HAS YOUR FACE! Awesome. And terrifying. In just a few million years, we’ve gone from the Rift Valley to the Uncanny Valley. Where to next?
All I know is that I’m going to send Ms. Hunter a photo of a stick.