NEW YORK (AP) — A comic saga of a creative writing professor and his letters of recommendation has won the Thurber Prize for American Humor.

Author Julie Schumacher received $5,000 and a crystal plaque for winning with "Dear Committee Members." She was honored Monday at the New York comedy club Carolines on Broadway.

The two runners-up were Roz Chast for her memoir "Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?" and Annabelle Gurwitch for "I See You Made an Effort: Compliments, Indignities, and Survival Stories from the Edge."

No woman had won the Thurber award until this year. The award was established in 1996 and is named for the late humorist and cartoonist James Thurber.

Previous winners include Jon Stewart, David Sedaris and Calvin Trillin.

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A man whose brother was murdered by ISIS, a woman whose husband died in the harrowing sea journey, a child who cried out "kill me instead!" when she saw her mother being crushed by a throng of people struggling to board a boat: These are the emotional stories of refugees in Europe that were captured this week in a poignant photo series.

Humans of New York has made a name for itself documenting the stories and photographs of random people living in the Big Apple. But on Friday, Brandon Stanton, the photographer behind the project, announced a shift in focus.

"For the next several days, I’m going to be sharing stories from refugees who are currently making their way across Europe," Stanton wrote on Facebook and Instagram. "Additionally, I’ll be spotlighting some of the people who are attempting to help facilitate their immigration and asylum."

"Together, these migrants are part of one of the largest population movements in modern history," he added. "But their stories are composed of unique and singular tragedies."

Stanton shared several tales of refugees who traveled many dangerous miles to arrive in Europe. One was the story of Muhammad, a Syrian man the photographer met in Iraq last year.

In a series of six photographs, Stanton shared Muhammad’s retelling of his last few months, the struggles he faced trying to raise enough money to buy fake papers, his father’s beating at the hands of police and his brother’s murder by ISIS.

"My brother had been killed by ISIS while he was working in an oil field," Muhammad is quoted as saying. "They found our address on his ID card, and they sent his head to our house, with a message: 'Kurdish people aren’t Muslims.' My youngest sister found my brother’s head. This was one year ago. She has not spoken a single word since."

Muhammad currently lives in Austria, where he was recently granted citizenship. His life in Europe, however, hasn’t been without its challenges.

On Monday, Stanton shared the story of a woman whose husband died after their boat sank en route to Europe.

He also posted a photograph showing a father and daughter in Lesvos, Greece.

The HONY photo project offers just a glimpse into the lives of migrants who are seeking refuge in Europe. According to the U.N. Refugee Agency, more than 160,000 migrants have arrived in Greece this year.

For more on this photo series, check out HONY’s Instagram and Facebook pages.

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"I was always interested in maps and infographics," Martin Vargic told The Huffington Post, "and the elegant, multilayered way they can portray large amounts of information about the world we live in."

Vargic is a 17-year-old artist from Slovakia who's, effectively, obsessed with maps. He spends three to four weeks crafting his intensely intricate visualizations, unique maps that represent big ideas about the way we live, rather than the actual places we populate. 

Take for example, his map of literary genres:

(Click here to zoom in)

Book nerds should appreciate his comprehensiveness. Below, we've zoomed into some of the genres Vargic has highlighted, including everything from romance and YA to Medieval Arabic and popular non-fiction. Grouped into constellations of "land masses" reminiscent of an atlas, his maps show where the various genres overlap and which authors and titles make up each area. 

Can you spot John Green? How about The Importance of Being Earnest?

Beyond literature, Vargic -- who began making infographics when he was 9 years old -- has tackled topics as particular as international stereotypes and as broad as the Internet. Those and many more of his maps (maps of YouTube, gaming, music and sports) will be featured in Miscellany of Curious Maps, published by Penguin Random House in the UK this month.

See more of his literary map, close up, below:

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In 1845, so the legend goes, an unclothed girl was spotted running on all fours through the forest near Del Rio, Texas, appearing barely human. Joined by a pack of wolves, the young girl allegedly attacked a herd of goats. The tale, though often ridiculed, spread like wildfire, and before long a group of Mexican vaqueros teamed up to hunt for the mythical Lobo Wolf Girl. 

On the third day of searching, the group supposedly captured the young girl by Espantosa Lake, surrounded by wolves. She was captured but soon escaped, tearing planks off a boarded-up window and escaping without a trace into the night. In 1852, she was said to be spotted for the final time, suckling two goat cubs. After that, she was never seen or heard from again. 

Stories like this, hovering in an area closer to fiction than truth, reappear throughout history, popping up in different spots around the globe for centuries. Every story is unique yet familiar -- a child, lost or neglected, takes up in the wild with the creatures residing there, adapting to their characteristics and modes of survival, slowly melting into their species. Instances of such feral children have been reported from 1845 to 2008, in habitats ranging from Cambodia to Russia to the United States.

Around two years ago, photographer Julia Fullerton-Batten encountered one such tale in the book The Girl with No Name. "The book tells the story of Marina Chapman, who as a 5-year old was kidnapped from her home and then left completely alone in a jungle in Columbia," Fullerton-Batten explained to The Huffington Post. "She survived for five years by co-existing with a band of capuchin monkeys, living a completely feral existence, before being ‘rescued’ and experiencing other misadventures."

The riveting story inspired the photographer to investigate further, digging up unbelievable tales of children in the wild, without language, culture, human contact.

"As a mother of two young boys I was appalled and intrigued in turn the more I learned about these cases," the photographer said. "My initial reactions were to question how parents could lose and especially neglect their child. My maternal instinct went into overdrive when I considered how these babies, toddlers and young people experienced their lives alone or in the company of wild animals.

"I then admired the fortitude they must have shown to survive such isolation and extreme circumstances, weather, hunger, illness. In any of the circumstances that I have read about, it completely overwhelms the boundaries of my comprehension."

Out of this morbid fascination grew inspiration. Fullerton-Batten resolved to recreate the unfathomable scenarios experienced by a variety of mythologized feral children, visualizing what to many is too unusual to even imagine. 

After conducting some research of her own, Fullerton-Batten consulted anthropologist and broadcaster Mary-Ann Ochota, who is fluent in the subject. Ochota even met three former feral children, now adults living in Fiji, Uganda and Ukraine. Fullerton-Batten also spoke with Vanessa James, co-author of Marin Chapman’s book. 

Fullerton-Batten's photographs are meticulously cast and staged, conjuring far out visions of children mingling amongst birds, dogs, monkeys and leopards. "The casting was incredibly important as I needed the children to have great acting abilities but also be the right age, body frame, skin and hair color, and facial characteristics." Sourcing and photographing the live animals was no easy feat either. 

"This project is intended to heighten the awareness that such cases have existed in the past and that they can still be occurring somewhere in the world, especially in the light of the world’s current turmoil," Fullerton-Batton explained. The resulting images bring 15 haunting tales to life in excruciating detail, conjuring a flood of emotions ranging from intrigue to fear to pure awe. 

The following photographs recreate the most bizarre tales of feral children culled from radically disparate times and places, accompanied by summaries of each story written by the artist. According to legend, most feral children, denied the power of language, think in terms of images instead of words. So it seems fitting to digest their stories in this visual form. 

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Surprise, surprise: Shonda Rhimes is not only a badass writer and producer -- she's also the best boss on the planet, according to Kerry Washington.  

On Sept. 25, Kerry Washington sat down with AOL Build to discuss her campaign Purple Purse, which highlights the devastating effects of financial abuse on domestic violence survivors. She also spoke about the new season of "Scandal," and (of course) writer and producer of the show Shonda Rhimes was brought up in all her glory. 

"One of the most amazing things about my job is that I have arguably, maybe not even arguably -- definitively -- the best boss on the planet. Shonda Rhimes is… the best," Washington said in the interview.  

She said that the best part about Rhimes is her willingness to be open and honest. "She’s just so honest and so generous and so supportive, but really when I come to her she will always say to me, ‘Just tell me the truth, just be honest,'" Washington said. "And no matter what that honesty is she can hear it and process it and metabolize it and present you with her truth in a way that’s helpful."

Shonda for president.  

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Anyone who has ever put pen to paper, crayon to coloring book, or hand to wet clay knows the healing powers embedded in such creative endeavors. More than just a pastime, art can be an escape, a stimulus, a war cry or a tranquil reprieve.

Art therapy, defined as "a form of psychotherapy that uses art media as its primary mode of communication," revolves around this principal of art's immense power. Open to children and adults of any background and experience, the still-evolving field explores modes of expression, understanding and healing that occur when paint touches canvas. While too many schools today run under the assumption that art is extraneous, a diversion from traditional academic subjects, art therapists know better. They know that art has the potential to change lives, and, even to save them.

Tally Tripp is the art therapy clinic director of George Washington University, specializing in individuals who have experienced trauma. Entering the field in its nascent phase, in the 1970s, Tripp was elemental in shaping the field as we know it today. 

Continuing The Huffington Post's coverage of the often misunderstood field that is art therapy, and the pioneers who continue to sculpt it, we reached out to Tripp to discuss the details of her career's past and present.  

How did you become interested in art therapy? How did you learn about the field? 

When I first learned about art therapy it was definitely a field in its infancy. Personally, I have always loved art making and combined that with an interest in working with people. In high school I spent summers in New York working for the Children’s Aid Society with disadvantaged children in a camp program. It was there, as a counselor in the arts and crafts program, I came across one of the original art therapy journals: the Bulletin of Art Therapy (edited by Elinor Ulman and produced between 1961-1970).

For many years, that journal was the only art therapy publication available. At the same time, in 1971, Elinor Ulman and her colleague, psychologist Bernard Levy started an art therapy program at the George Washington University. Pretty quickly my goal became to study art therapy in the master’s program at GW, which I did between 1978 and 1981. Now, full circle, I am a full time professor in the art therapy program at GW and the director of the GW Art Therapy Clinic.

How did art therapy look when you first immersed yourself in it? 

In the late 1970s, art therapy was still an emerging profession. It was definitely an exciting time for the field as we students were taught by some of the early pioneers: Elinor Ulman, Edith Kramer and Hanna Kwiatkowska -- innovative thinkers developing clinical approaches that were based largely on intuition coupled with psychoanalytic thinking that was popular at the time. Also in those days there were few texts or research studies on art therapy to guide us, so we learned primarily by our experiences and our clinical work. As art therapy was a relatively unknown profession, we all put time and effort into spreading the word and educating others about its value.

The field is more established now, and more often than not, people have heard of art therapy and have some understanding of how it works. Art therapists now have licenses in some states as well as levels of professional credentialing and board certification. Beyond that, we have a lot of art therapy literature at our fingertips including research studies supporting the efficacy of art therapy and describing how it is utilized across many settings and populations. Art therapists can now be found in various settings -- from medical and psychiatric hospitals, to schools, geriatric facilities, community and studio settings, and in private practice.

What are your areas of interest in the field? 

I have maintained a private practice in art therapy for over 30 years. My specialization is working with individuals who have experienced trauma. I find these clients are excellent candidates for art therapy precisely because the art can provide a means for expressing the inexpressible feelings that are often shut down or pushed away from consciousness in response to traumatic events. It has been exciting in the last 25 years to see that neuroscience research has validated the kind of work we do. Through brain imagery, we now know that the cognitive and executive functioning of the brain is for the most part “off line” when people are recalling their traumas, rendering them essentially “speechless.” This helps explain why traditional verbal therapy is often not enough when working with trauma, and why art (imagery) and other experiential therapies are so effective.

I reached out to you in part because of Suicide Awareness Month. In your private practice do you work with many patients grappling with suicidal thoughts? What are some of the methods you practice in such circumstances? 

Any therapist in private practice will have to deal with patients who are struggling with suicidal thoughts from time to time. Negative beliefs and hopelessness can render the individual helpless to combat the urge for self-harm. To work with suicidal thoughts, a clinician must first assess how developed the plan is, and, if the patient is truly in imminent danger of self-harm, hospitalization may be required. But hospitalization has its limits and is only one step.

Beyond the immediate safety needs, I work on resourcing my patients to help them develop other coping strategies so that they can better manage their feelings and find alternate responses. Some interventions might include creating a safety plan with a hierarchy of actions to take, or to come up with a list of resources that can be quickly accessed when the suicidal impulse arises, or helping with a variety of cognitive and behavioral restructuring techniques, or perhaps increasing the frequency of therapy sessions, etc. Sometimes I will recommend a soothing art activity for “homework” such as working in an art coloring book or journal, that can assist with a person feeling grounded and safe. Art can soothe anxiety and help with re-focusing attention to something more positive and less destructive than a suicidal plan.

Are most of the patients you encounter already involved in art? Are they ever skeptical?  

It is true that most people think of going to an art therapist because they enjoy making art and are already involved in it somehow. But that is not the only kind of person who will benefit from art therapy.

For example, one man I worked with was also being seen in marriage therapy and was referred to me because it was determined that he needed to access more emotional depth. This man had no apparent interest in art, but agreed to see me as an experiment because art therapy had been recommended. I invited him to work on a picture of simply lines and shapes and just “see what happens.” His first picture, a simple downward sloping line was created in a matter of seconds. But when we held the “picture” up and explored it from a distance, he became struck by the downward motion and then exclaimed: “This is exactly what I have been trying to describe. It looks like my mother’s lap. Empty. She was never able to really hold me!” The image and description of not being held as a child became a fundamental theme in our work together. And within a few months, this patient enrolled in a painting class and began a new appreciation for art.

Can you explain what you hope to achieve with a suicidal patient through art therapy? What changes are you looking to make?

Often the artwork will convey a suicidal feeling of hopelessness or despair long before words are consciously available. The image can provide a means for discussing feelings that are either unclear or difficult to verbalize. Art works tend to be self-referential so we work actively with the images and themes that are produced.

For example, an image of a desolate landscape might signal an empty feeling and suicidal state in the artist. While I do not interpret the image, the patient and I will work together to explore the metaphor and any personal meaning or feelings that are attached. Because the picture is something we can look at together, it gives both artist and therapist an opportunity to “do” something with it. Art therapy can empower the individual to find a solution or create a “preferable ending” in the art. It is interesting to note that creating artwork that challenges the initial feelings of hopelessness will actually affect the neural firing in the brain. The more practice a person has exploring “preferable endings” for example, the more this will result in the brain finding alternatives to self-destructive behavior. So making art can be a good practice for seeking solutions and reducing negative thoughts.

Is there a certain type of patient you think is more suited to art therapy as opposed to other therapy methods? 

Anyone who is willing to explore feelings through the process of making art can benefit from art therapy. Some people will naturally be drawn to this kind of therapy -- children in particular where their natural language is through art and play.

Adolescents are also good candidates for art therapy because they may be resistant to traditional talk therapies and usually will enjoy working with art materials. I work with adults, however, and maintain that they are still children inside, as it is often an adult embodying that child state coming in to my office. The art helps bypass the defense and intellectualization inherent in verbal language. When a new (adult) patient is referred to me, I often start by asking, “Why do you think art therapy will help?” Right there, I am getting an alliance with the patient by suggesting that I believe that the experiential and creative nature of making art, in the company of an attuned art therapist, will make a difference.

What makes art therapy so powerful?

Art therapy is more than just making nice pictures. In fact, art therapy is more often a process of making ugly or messy pictures that depict a feeling state, not a final product that is all neat and tied together. Art therapy is about that creative process where the client, in the company of an art therapist, is working and re working problems via a range of fluid and variable art materials.

In private practice, I find the spontaneously created art pieces are the most meaningful and often help a person find resolution for specific traumatic experiences. The benefit occurs when the art made facilitates a sense of mastery over the problem. For example, a patient who has experienced years of abuse or neglect in childhood may be able to finally express feelings that had been avoided or pushed out of conscious awareness because they were overwhelming at the time. The images often speak more loudly than words. With the encouragement of the art therapist, difficult feelings can be expressed through making art.

The process varies widely so there is no one way to describe what happens in a session. When a person first faces a blank piece of paper, there might be some resistance or hesitancy to explore feelings so the resultant images may appear tight and controlled as in a line drawing or pencil sketch. But after some trust is established in the therapeutic relationship, the art process can move towards more expressive activity, which would suggest the patient is accessing stronger emotion. Often the patient will begin experimenting with more evocative materials at that point, for example using paint or clay to express feelings like anger, shame or fear. The art therapist is knowledgeable about psychological problems and the use of various art media; the process is flexible and individually focused to support the patient to find materials and techniques that connect with the issues at hand. And as a patient becomes more open to the process and discovers more creative resources within, the art product will also change. In art therapy, there is always that creative edge that keeps the process dynamic and contributes to the process of healing.

Need help? In the U.S., call 1-800-273-8255 for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. 

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When Katy and Justin Patten hired a photographer to take family portraits with their children this year, they had a special vision in mind. The Wisconsin parents wanted to include shadows that would represent the two baby boys they lost four years ago.

Photographer Linda Gittins helped bring their vision to life with this inspiring image.

During her first pregnancy in 2011, Patten went into preterm labor at 23 weeks, and doctors were unable stop the progression. She delivered her twin boys -- Aiden and Gavin -- two days apart and lost them shortly after.

"It felt like my heart was ripped out of my chest. We tried for a year to get pregnant, and then they were taken away from us," the mom told The Huffington Post. "I was in a really dark place after losing them." Though joining a support group and doing things to remember the babies helped her get through the grieving process, Patten said all future pregnancies "were ruined" for her as she was overwhelmed with fear and anxiety.

Four years after the loss, Patten is the mother of two healthy little girls, 3-year-old Ava and 13-month-old Giuliana. At the suggestion of a friend, the mom sought out a photographer who could incorporate all four of her children in a family portrait. That's what led her to Gittins, who owns Lulu B. Photography.

"I was hesitant, but agreed because I suffered a similar loss with our first child," Gittins said of the project in a HuffPost interview. The photographer used the shadows of a friend's child, who was around the same age the Patten's sons would've been. 

"It warms my heart to know that this helps the Patten family feel whole," she said. "They now have a photo that represents their entire family including their angel babies."

Patten told HuffPost that the finished product made her feel "initially sad for what we didn’t have." But, she added, "Now, it makes me happy to have something that represents us as a family."

The mom hopes that her photo will reach other parents who've experienced infant loss. "I would hope that it would help someone through the grieving process and that it would let them know that they are not alone," she said. "It is a topic that hardly anyone talks about. It takes someone that actually can empathize with you to help bring you out of that darkness."

 H/T BabyCenter

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The massive success of Carly Rae Jepsen's 2012 hit "Call Me Maybe" posed "a huge challenge" for the creation of her second album, the pop star told HuffPost Live on Monday. 

"I'll be honest: Yeah, there definitely was a moment where I felt a little bit like, 'Wow, this song ['Call Me Maybe'] is working, it's working, it's working -- stop working!" she told host Nancy Redd. "Because we were just trying to put out the next single, and there was so much attention to this one thing that we almost couldn't beat it."

The song, which blasted Jepsen into the zeitgeist after a video of Justin Bieber lip-syncing the single went viral, was a "wonderful gift," but it led the songstress to think critically about her future in music.

"There was a moment or two -- a few months, I think -- where I was sort of like, 'I don't know, I have a desire to rebel this in a big way. I have a desire to kind of stay paralyzed,'" she said. 

At the urging of close friends, Jepsen braved the studio and fought against self-doubt to record her latest album, "E*MO*TION," which has gone on to be critically lauded.

"Every time my mind would go in a negative way, I'd redirect it back to that spot of it just being at a wonderful thing, and I took my time," she explained. "I didn't rush it, and I finally waited until I felt like I had songs that I was more proud of than anything I'd made so far."

Watch more from Carly Rae Jepsen's conversation with HuffPost Live here.

Want more HuffPost Live? Listen on the go with free downloads of our best interviews on iTunes here, and subscribe here for our morning email to guarantee you won't miss our buzziest conversations. 

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What happens after you become a Playboy centerfold?

Pictures of you might be taken to the moon (Dede Lind, Miss November 1969). You might have sex with Elvis Presley and enjoy a king-sized breakfast with him (Victoria Peters, Miss April 1972).

And you might dump Tom Cruise ("I didn't like the way he addressed the waitstaff"), indulge in "hairy" sex with Robin Williams, and snort coke and slamdance with John Belushi (Kim Malin, Miss May 1982).

Charlotte Kemp, otherwise known as "Miss December 1982," put together "Centerfolds"  -- a fantastic collection of stories from 20 playmates and five photographers -- that paints a picture of what it's like to step into the Playboy spotlight.

"Most of us were just out of high school and naive when swept into this world of the rich, powerful and famous," Kemp writes in the introduction. "Being shy wasn't an option."

 The beautiful Ms. Kemp joined us for the HuffPost Weird News Podcast, along with Cindy Guyer, a March 1999 celebrity pictorial. And we talked about everything from three-way sex with Hugh Hefner to what a miserable lowlife Bill Cosby was, even when he was best known as America's No. 1 TV dad. 

 LISTEN: CENTERFOLDS GET DOWN AND DIRTY

Kemp's wild ride began in 1981, when she moved from Omaha to Chicago, to begin her life as a model. At the time, she was dating Gary Fencik, who played for the Chicago Bears, and was living right near the Hef's Playboy Mansion. Shortly after appearing in "Risky Business" as a hooker she decided to take the plunge.

"I had a 34-DDD chest and was very, very self-conscious," she recalls in the book when she contemplated her first shoot. "My chest had only been bestowed upon me during the last two years. I was a late bloomer, literally. I came from a very conservative Midwestern family."

 Kemp poured some wine, then charged out to Hef's infamous grotto and did her best.

Over the next few years, she would become a top Playboy model, holding such titles as the first "Miss Budweiser," and "The Best Breasts in the USA."

 Together with other playmates, she raised money for charity with the Playboy Running Team and wrote about her experiences in "For My Eyes Only," which includes her poetry and short stories.

Kemp also stared in 25 horror movies, including "Frankenhooker," and appeared on "Inside Edition" and "The tonight Show."

The women and men who contribute to this book, on balance, look back fondly on their experiences, but they are often candid about the dangers of fame and celebrity, as well as the screwed up ways some of us deal with sex.

Cynthia Meyers (Miss December 1968), who died of lung cancer in 2011, recalls that Bill Cosby had a reputation of being one of the most vile visitors at the Playboy Mansion. 

"My stomach still turns when I see Bill Cosby in his ads sitting with a bunch of youngsters pitching Jell-O pudding," Meyers told Kemp, years before the recent spate of accusations against the disgraced entertainer.

"I always wondered if any of the Jell-O ad executives ever knew about his indescretions. I saw firsthand how he would use drugs to have sex with women. I never shed a tear when I heard his son was murdered on the 405 in Los Angeles. I do feel very sorry for his son, but he paid with his life for the sins of his father."

 Meyers, who parlayed her Playboy fame into a part in the Russ Meyer classic, "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls," is otherwise largely upbeat about her experiences.  She doesn't specifically say what Cosby did, but Kemp agrees that the attitude she takes speaks for itself.

"I decided to assemble this collection of stories because, at its essence, it is a slice of Americana. Being a centerfold is a membership in an exclusive sorority, partly because there are only 12 of us a year," she writes. "This book has been a labor of love and honesty from these iconic centerfolds, photographers and celebrity models."

Thanks for listening to the HuffPost Weird News Podcast, a labor of love brought to you by producer, Katelyn Bogucki and sound engineer Brad Shannon. We can't continue to do it without your support, so please stay tuned and give us a review, people!

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Halloween costume fatigue is real -- and we're here to help. 

Making a creative costume choice year after year takes a lot of effort (and Googling) so we've decided to do the work for you. We've rounded up a list of clever, comfortable and a few crazy ideas to make your Halloween so much more boo-tiful. (And never fear, there are no sexy crayons, sexy Sesame Street characters or sexy Donald Trump costumes in here.)  

Here are 32 creative -- and simple -- costume ideas so that you can roll up to your October 31 party in style. The best part? You can make almost all of these at home! 

Need more costume ideas? We've got you covered. Head over here, here and here.  

Check out other awesome Halloween costumes below: 

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Perhaps you have a Vincent van Gogh coffee table book. Perhaps you've seen his works in a museum. Perhaps, like myself, you've even seen a tourist couple rub their hands over a van Gogh at one of the big New York museums when they thought nobody was looking.

But that cursory knowledge makes you a potato eater compared with the familiarity of someone who's spent over half a decade researching at the museum devoted to the artist in his works, or a lifetime sharing his name.

As part of this year's commemorative van Gogh celebrations -- based around the 125th anniversary of his death -- the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam just opened their blockbuster exhibition "Munch: Van Gogh," which pairs the Dutch and Norwegian artists together to highlight the little-known similarities of the two European masters.

In anticipation of this exhibit, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam offered The Huffington Post access to multiple employees, including Teio Meedendorp, a key researcher for the museum, and Willem van Gogh (born with the first name Vincent), an ambassador for the museum and the great grand-nephew of the beloved artist. Willem had Vincent's original paintings hanging in his house growing up.

HuffPost will be publishing a brief series of articles based on these and other interviews from the museum, with this first one tackling trivia that could only come from spending years deep in research -- or being part of the family.

1. Contrary to popular myth, van Gogh sold more than one painting and didn't work with candles in his hat.

With there being as many myths about van Gogh as there are lights in a starry night, it may be difficult for the casual fan to separate the true stories from the false ones. Unlike the yellows of van Gogh's painting, quite a few myths somehow haven't faded over time.

Meedendorp told HuffPost that one myth that endures is the misconception that van Gogh only sold one painting in his entire lifetime. According to Meedendorp, researchers of the artist know that van Gogh actually sold "several" paintings before his death.

This myth is particularly unfortunate because it also further fuels the idea that van Gogh was fully rejected as an artist while alive, which wasn't the case. Meedendorp points out that he was only working as an artist for 10 years before his suicide and that "it's after some time that you get known and you start to sell." The key researcher at the Van Gogh Museum further explained, "His misfortune was that he only worked for 10 years when he killed himself. He would have sold more if he had stayed alive."

On the more romantic side, a popular (and equally false) myth recounts how van Gogh would paint at night, using candles in his hat for light. "It's quite a wonderful myth ... quite lovely in a sense," Meedendorp said, before dispelling any of its truth.

According to Meedendorp, the myth originates from the French journalist Gustave Coquiot, who wrote a book on van Gogh in 1922 which included the "anecdote that [van Gogh] was painting with this candle in his hat along the river for 'Starry Night.'" But van Gogh wrote in his own recollection of that moment that it was done "simply by gaslight."

2. Young van Gogh would regularly attempt to turn in flowers instead of his homework, which he often didn't complete.

Van Gogh had little interest in doing homework, perhaps one of the more relatable details of his lifetime.

When he studied theology in Amsterdam, he also had to take courses on subjects such as algebra, Latin and Greek. According to Meedendorp, he wasn't concerned with these secondary classes for priest-work, and so he put off his lessons.

A teacher of van Gogh's during this time told a story, Meedendorp recalled from his research, during which the teacher "could exactly tell in the distance [as van Gogh headed toward him] if [van Gogh] had or had not made his lessons because he would have had some flowers with him." Having little money, van Gogh would steal the flowers from a graveyard on the way, intending to turn those instead of his homework. This "underlined the soft character that Vincent had," Meedendorp said.

3. When van Gogh felt as if he did a bad job at theological school, he would flagellate himself with a stick.

Pulitzer Prize-winning Steven W. Naifeh and Gregory White Smith's book, Van Gogh: The Life, details how van Gogh would punish himself physically for religious reasons. Some claims from the book include van Gogh going into storms without an overcoat, only eating black rye bread and sleeping on a walking stick.

Although the Van Gogh Museum disagrees with a widely publicized section in Van Gogh -- particularly chapters in which the authors claim that van Gogh didn't commit suicide and was murdered -- Meedendorp did talk about van Gogh's surprising propensity for self-harm.

Meedendorp said that "van Gogh would sometimes hurt himself or punish himself if he was not making lessons," an account that also comes from the aforementioned teacher in Amsterdam. 

4. Van Gogh's love life was often complicated, but when he fell for a cafe owner while penniless, he won her over by dedicating new flower paintings to her, rather than buying the real thing.

Willem van Gogh told HuffPost of a story he likes "very very much," involving an affair his great grand-uncle had with an older ex-model who ran a Parisian restaurant called the Café du Tambourin.

As the great grand-nephew tells it, van Gogh became enamored with Agostina Segatori and eventually made a portrait of her (pictured above left, with Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot creating the other). But during the initial courting, van Gogh "wanted to buy flowers for her and to express his love for her, but he couldnt afford it," Willem said.

No longer needing to steal flowers from the local graveyard, van Gogh could act through his art. Willem continued, "When he met Segatori, he was practicing on still-lifes and especially on flower still-lifes." Willem began to laugh and then said, "Every bouquet of flowers he painted, he said to Segatori, 'This one is for you,' instead of giving her a real bunch of flowers. That's a story that I think is very cute."

According to the legend surrounding their encounters, van Gogh would often pay for meals at the tambourine-themed restaurant with his paintings, which would then be put up on the walls. This last detail may just be one of those prevailing myths, however.

5. A family with a wife and children was "the one thing that he really wanted in life." Van Gogh never succeeded.

"The one thing that he really wanted in life [...] was to have a wife and children and, of course, he never succeeded," Meedendorp told HuffPost.

According to Meedendorp, the artist knew that "it was difficult for him to meet people," and consequently, start a family. However, since his own family had been so important to him growing up, he continued to dream of having his own.

He did spend a year and a half "playing family," as Meedendorp described, in the Dutch city of The Hague, with a model and former prostitute, Sien Hoornik, and her child. After this relatively long relationship, though, van Gogh's broader relationship with women "was more difficult and much shorter," said Meedendorp.

The artist had happy but mixed feelings that his brother, Theo, was able to to achieve such a family. When Theo told him he was going to have a son, Vincent van Gogh painted the now famous "Almond Blossom" and gifted it to the couple. Willem van Gogh told HuffPost that this work, which was dedicated to his grandfather, is a particular favorite of his descendants. 

BONUS: You've been pronouncing van Gogh incorrectly. It's supposed to sound like "van Khokh."

Speaking with these well-researched members of the Van Gogh Museum -- who are, of course, Dutch -- caused a realization that van Gogh isn't pronounced "van-go."

While all three were beyond helpful (and nobody corrected my American pronunciations), it may have taken me too long over the phone to realize there wasn't another prolific painter during van Gogh's lifetime with a name that sounded mysteriously like "van-hawk."

In any case, now you can van-go back and re-read this article with a more accurate pronunciation in your head.

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A Florida mom's devastating Facebook post about her experience with stillbirth is sending a powerful message to moms and dads across the social media sphere.

In a Sept. 21 post, mom Natalie Morgan shared her story of loss and issued a poignant plea to her fellow parents.

"[P]lease just remember, while you're awake at 3 a.m. because you have a baby in your arms keeping you up that late, I'm up at 3 a.m. because I don't," she wrote in her gut-wrenching post. "And I would give anything in this world to have a baby spitting up on me, being colicky for all hours of the day and night, screaming, not letting me put her down, cracking my nipples from breastfeeding, keeping me up all night."

In the post -- which has been shared over 300,000 times -- Morgan told the heartbreaking story of her daughter Eleanor Josephine, who died in utero when she was 40 weeks pregnant. The mom delivered the stillborn baby on Sept. 11, and a photographer from Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep came to the hospital to take a series of emotional remembrance photos, which Morgan included in her post.

Addressing people who have children, are pregnant or may someday in the future have little ones, the mom wrote:

"There will be times your child will scream and cry any time you try to put him or her down. Or they'll cry even as they're in your arms and you've done everything you can possibly think of to get them to stop. There will be sleepless nights, multiple diaper changes in a matter of minutes, spit up in your hair, pee on your shirt, and poop in your hands, and again -- so much screaming from the baby, and probably from you as well. Every time that happens, every time you feel frustrated and want to run away, please remember my story."

The mom described the emptiness and helplessness she and her husband Brian felt. And even after the trauma of Eleanor's death and birth, Morgan said she's still living with painful reminders of the loss in the physical effects on her body -- from "painfully engorged breasts" and postpartum bleeding to "a stitched nether region" and "flabby stomach." Though she is the mother of a young son, Morgan said she still grieves for the parenting experiences she will never have with her daughter.

Ultimately, the mom's plea is simple but powerful. "All I ask of you is when you have your dark moments with your baby -- when you're at your wits' end and feel like you can't go on anymore when you're only getting an hour or two of sleep a night -- instead of begging your child to go to sleep and being swallowed up in your frustration and exhaustion, find the tiniest bit of strength within you to keep going, and say a prayer of gratitude for your child, as difficult as it may be in that moment," she wrote.

"And if you would, say a prayer for me and all the mothers whose children were taken from them too soon," she continued. "Say a prayer for my sweet, sweet Eleanor who never got to know life outside my womb. Please. Do it for Eleanor. And do it for her mommy who loves her and misses her beyond measure."

H/T BabyCenter

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The only thing truly chilling about Halloween is how little fabric manufacturers use for women's costumes. 

In the name of Science™, we researched popular costume ideas for men and women, and compared them side-by-side. We began to see a theme emerge. Manufacturers assume that ladies are looking to show a lot of skin, while men's costumes offer a lot more coverage (and, thus, warmth). 

Women should wear whatever they want, be it on Halloween or any other night of the year. And if that includes hot pants, more power to you! But where are the lycra cut-out costumes for men? Shouldn't Halloween be an equal-opportunity night for bodily display? 

 Check out these 21 jarring costume comparisons, and head here and here for some more creative Halloween costume ideas. 

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Lena Dunham told radio host Elvis Duran on Tuesday that she thinks her HBO show "Girls" will end after its sixth season. 

“Never say never, but that is the way that we’re thinking about it right now, and we’re starting to think about sort of how to wrap up the storylines of these particular young women,” Dunham said on Z100's "Elvis Duran and the Morning Show." “I started working on this show when I was 23, and now I’m going to be 30 so it kind of feels right that this show kind of sandwiched my 20s and then I go off into the world.”

Season 5 of "Girls" premieres this January; filming wrapped in August. HBO has not yet renewed the series beyond that, but the network rarely renews more than one season at a time -- and the show still attracts enough buzz that renewal seems like a sure thing. Plus, Dunham told Variety in April that she and showrunner Jenni Konner had discussed the idea of ending the show after season 6 with HBO, explaining that she prefers the British model of limited TV runs to the American determination to continue shows for as long as possible.

Don't cry for Dunham, though: she has lots of other stuff on her plate. She also discussed her views on feminism, her upcoming guest spot on "The Simpsons" and her new email newsletter Lenny in the course of the 7-minute interview with Duran, which you can listen to in full here: 

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SAN FRANCISCO -- An artist was shot to death Tuesday while working on a public mural in Oakland, California, sponsored by a group trying to reduce violence in the troubled and changing neighborhood. 

An argument broke out between the artist and shooter beneath a highway overpass around 10:30 a.m. as the artist worked on a painting called "Self as Superhero," authorities said. The work had been designed as a collaboration between West Oakland middle school students and area muralists. Students were scheduled to work with artists at the site on Wednesday.

The gunman fled after the shooting and remained at large. The victim's name wasn't released, but police described him in a statement as an adult man. Police didn't release a description of the shooter. 

"All they were doing was painting, trying to beautify a neighborhood that has seen its challenges," Oakland police Lt. Roland Holmgren told the Oakland Tribune.  

The shooting took place in West Oakland, beneath Interstate 580 on West Street. Violent crime in the area historically has been above average. Recently, the neighborhood has experienced rapid changes from gentrification. 

Oakland has had 71 homicides in 2015, compared with 56 at this point in in 2014. 

Plans called for a 4,000-square foot mural. Portions that are in progress show children on an a tree-lined street of homes. according to the Oakland Tribune. It's supposed to be the third in a series of six murals by the Attitudinal Healing Connection.

"The murals serve as a constant reminder of the importance of dreaming big," says a description on a fundraising site. "Its long-term impact on our youth and community is something Oakland can celebrate."

 The online fundraising campaign underway before the shooting sought to raise $10,000 for supplies and some compensation for the artists working with the middle schoolers. 

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Quiet. Then the hiss of robotic arms pistoning. Metal limbs squeak and clank as they beat on two rudimentary drums. A motor buzzes shrilly.

The Robotic Church, an installation of dozens of robotic sculptures in a historic Red Hook church, has begun its symphony. Somehow, the shrieking, clanging, motorized sounds unite into something musical -- hauntingly humanoid, yet eerily inhuman.

The orchestra dwells in installation art’s uncanny valley.

Chico MacMurtrie, the artist behind the installation, constructed the robots over the course of nearly two decades, before bringing them to Brooklyn in 2012 for a church installation. “For 13 years, I considered this concept of the Robotic Church,” he told The Huffington Post. Amorphic Robot Works, a collective of artists, scientists and engineers he founded, had used the location as a studio since 2001, and the ecclesiastic architecture inspired him. “Originally this building was a Norwegian seamen’s church. Like much of Red Hook, this building suffered from neglect.” 

More challenges lay ahead. Hurricane Sandy flooded the studio in October 2012, just as the installation was premiering. But the robots survived, and MacMurtrie has since staged Robotic Church masses in the space. 

Arranged around the altar, in place of saints’ statues, a priest and attendants, the kinetic sculptures play out an ancient ritual of spirituality, each with their own aspect of humanity to mimic. One robot slowly, effortfully climbs a rope. Another draws abstract artworks. Another thumps on a large drum. One attempts to turn somersaults.

“Each one of these machines is a study of human motion as well as a study of sound, each has its unique gesture, each has its own sound or multiple sounds and gestures,” said MacMurtrie. "In a sense its an evolution of the human condition. Each machine gave to the next in terms of technique [...] as well as evolution of character and what they were capable of doing."

The installation's juxtaposition of spiritual worship with fully mechanized humanoids prods at uncomfortable questions about the relationship between man and machine. What is lost for our souls when more and more of our lives are taken over by cold technology? “It was my fear of the effects of technology in controlling society that inspired me to create this,” explained MacMurtrie. The robots, repeating their basic, human gestures on schedule, struck him as “controlled by a computer much like our lives being controlled today by technology.”

But there’s an appropriately religious resonance to the display as well. “There is an amazing feeling when you work on something very intensely for a period of time,” he said. “There is the magic moment when you turn it on, in this case breathe life into it, literally with air ... I mean, I am literally their maker.” For the artists and technicians working to create robotic art and to train them to perform their functions, a shadow of a creating God’s relationship with humanity is at play.

From a creator’s perspective, the beings unleashed may seem relatively rudimentary, but they’re also the result of loving labor and remarkable in their own right. MacMurtrie hopes audiences will be left “feeling compassion for the human condition, how special we are as humans in our evolution of communications.” Like his own creations, we've come so far from our origins, but every step along our evolution has been worthy of wonder.

The Robotic Church will be open for private performances Oct. 9-11. Tickets via Atlas Obscura.

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Is there a boogeyman hiding in my closet, preparing to pounce from under my pile of dirty laundry? Can my cat read my mind? Is everyone hanging out without me?

Most fears are irrational -- even those we have to shoo away as rational adult humans. To address the weird things that scare us, and perhaps instill a sense of camaraderie along the way, cartoonist Fran Krause started sketching these fears, and sharing them on his now popular Tumblr.

“Let's say you're walking in the rain, and you forgot your umbrella, and you're soaking wet,” Krause told The Huffington Post. “And it's rough. And then you cross paths with someone in the same situation. You both exchange a glance that says, ‘This is rough, but at least I'm not the only one here. Good luck out there.’ I guess that's the feeling I'm looking for.”

We chatted with the artist to learn more:

You started out by drawing your own fears -- what’s your greatest irrational fear? And which did you illustrate first?

I don't think I have a greatest irrational fear -- I think that's one of the things that defines an irrational fear to me. They come and go. If I'm not sitting around some freshly sharpened pencils, I'm not going to be worried about getting my eyes poked out. However, as soon as I'm erasing something with a sharp pencil, I'll be worried that I'm going to sneeze and jab my eye out on the pointy end.

 Sometimes I draw fears that are rational, and sometimes they're things that would never, ever happen. I think the constant feature is they're all fears that are hard to get out of your head, like a catchy song.

The first one I ever drew was the one about animals being able to tell if you're a good or bad person. Usually I have this feeling with cats and dogs, but I thought a deer in the snow would be a better judge of character.

Do you find the act of publishing, and therefore confessing to, your fears helps you deal with them better?

I think putting your worries into words and pictures helps make them finite. It helps you to step back and see your behavior and fear more clearly. It's also been really helpful to know there are so many people with similar feelings. I've noticed that, each time I make a comic, I receive a few submissions with fears almost identical to the one I just drew. The first few times this happened, I thought, "Why are they sending this? I just drew it." But I think it's because people see their fears as comics, and they want to connect and feel like they're not alone in their thoughts. 

As your blog gained traction, you started illustrating readers’ fears, too. Was there one fear in particular that received multiple requests? Was there one you found particularly amusing?

There are some fears I think of as "classic" fears. There are a lot of people worried about swallowing watermelon seeds and then having watermelons grow in their stomachs. I've had a lot of people tell me that they can't stand people touching their navel, because they're worried it'll unravel and their guts will fall out. I held back on that one for a while, since it felt a bit too simple to me. Then one day someone sent me a little more detail. They said that their grandmother had warned them if they played with their belly button, their guts would fall out, and they'd be forced to live the rest of their life as an outcast, carrying their guts in a laundry basket. When I read that one, it really hit me. It added a story and consequences. I had to draw it. I'm looking for fears that affect me.

It's hard to pick one that I find particularly amusing -- most of them are kinda creepy. I had fun drawing the comic from a couple weeks ago, where the narrator wonders how long their body might sit before it's discovered -- I don't know if "amusing" is the right word. Let's say you're walking in the rain, and you forgot your umbrella, and you're soaking wet. And it's rough. And then you cross paths with someone in the same situation. You both exchange a glance that says, "This is rough, but at least I'm not the only one here. Good luck out there." I guess that's the feeling I'm looking for, more than amusement. Is there a name for that feeling? I'd say "commiseration" but I think that implies more complaining than I'm talking about here.

A lot of the fears you draw reflect on childhood worries. Do you find these differ from the irrational fears of adults?

I think there are big differences between childhood and adult fears, but I don't think there's much difference in the emotions that come out of those fears. Adults have a bad habit of belittling the fears of children, because kids tend to be afraid of things that mean them no harm. Vacuum cleaners, clowns, that sort of thing. Less logic, more emotion. However, if a little kid is freaking out about their first day at school, or a monster in their closet, their feelings are just as intense as an adult who's worried about their job, or mortality. I'm trying to find the feelings in the fears.

What mood do you hope readers will experience when reading your comics?

There's one I drew quite a while ago, someone had written to me about trypophobia. If you're squeamish, DO NOT do a Google image search for trypophobia. The comic was a fear that the writer would find the pores on the back of their hands suddenly grown large -- big enough for bugs to fit inside. After I drew that one, I got a message from someone saying that it made them scream and throw their phone across the room. I thought that was a pretty good reaction.

There's quite a range of fears out there. Some are gross, and some are scary. Some are lonely, some are funny, or sad, or weird. I'm really lucky in that my audience doesn't expect a "scare" or a "cry" or some other specific emotion every week. They seem to appreciate the variety. It keeps the comic more interesting for me too. I've just finished the 200th comic, and I'm still having fun. I'm not really looking for a specific emotion from my readers, I just hope that they're affected in their own way.

Krause’s illustrations -- some of which address his own fears, many of which are submitted by readers -- are available in a book out this week.  Uncover more deep, dark fears below.

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This article originally appeared on artnet News.

A marine biologist studying coral reefs off the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific made an amazing discovery this week when he noticed a "bright red-and-green spaceship" approaching his way in the pitch dark waters. The glowing underwater body turned out to be a hawksbill sea turtle, a critically endangered species.

While it is known that Hawksbill shells change colors depending on water temperature, the biofluorescent capacities of the marine reptile have never been recorded until now.

The scientist, David Gruber, a National Geographic Emerging Explorer, was on site as part of a TBA21 Academy expedition, a new art initiative that pairs up artists and scientists to work on projects related to environmental issues. In 2002, art collector and superyacht owner Francesca von Habsburg founded Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary (TBA21), which has long been dedicated to ambitious projects that defy categorizations.

The Academy has funded similar expedition to Fiji, the Galapagos Islands, Iceland, and the Caribbean Sea, among other places.

National Geographicreleased a video of the groundbreaking discovery yesterday.

In the video, Gruber describes how the discovery was made by chance when the turtle happened into the camera's view. A yellow filter allowed the marine biologist to pick up the creature's glowing properties.

"I've been [studying turtles] for a long time and I don't think anyone's ever seen this," Alexander Gaos, director of the Eastern Pacific Hawksbill Initiative, who was not involved in the find, told the National Geographic. "This is really quite amazing."

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There are certain tropes we've come to recognize and expect when it comes to horror in film. The suspicious glance. The car that won't start. The rattling door. The flickering lights. The silence that swells with intensity. The thing itself and the blood it leaves behind. There's a narrative arc that escalates and explodes, then settles into eerie tranquility. The horror itself is sandwiched between fluffy slices of comfort and safety.

But in a work of art, the timing is all off. There's no building of suspense, no spooky soundtrack to signal: Danger! Danger! There's just the image, the thing itself, without explanation or resolution. 

Artist Sarah Sitkin makes sculptural artworks that will make all your little arm hairs stand at attention. Gruesome and festering, Sitkin's multimedia creations resemble the face of a monster revealed three quarters through the story to wreak havoc. Only Silkin's mutated forms, grounded in bodily functions gone awry, come out of nowhere, and never face defeat. They linger there, on the page, in your memory, immortal and indomitable. 

Sitkin grew up, not too surprisingly, in Burbank, California, a city just northeast of Hollywood, housing copious film studios and entertainment-centric businesses. "My family runs a small hobby shop that my grandpa started in 1946 called Kit Kraft," the artist said in an interview with The Huffington Post. "In the '90s the shop was a hub for SFX artists and I remember, as a kid, seeing these guys come into the shop with sculptures of creatures, masks of all kinds, models of alien spacecrafts, and dioramas of prehistoric lands. These early experiences definitely wove themselves into my subconscious mind."

Growing up in one of the entertainment capitals of the world, Sitkin drank up the glamour and gore of the horror industry. "Films had a huge impact on me, as a young person. Cinema with little dialogue captivated me, and demonstrated the emotional power of imagery in motion. Particularly the work of Švankmajer, Parajanov, Jodorowsky, and Kubrick."

Sitkin started making art as a child using mostly paint and found objects. She later began to experiment with other media including molding, casting, photography and installation. Today she has honed a sculptural process all her own. "I don't know what to call it," she explained, "I just want to keep creating without limiting myself to certain materials or a specific process."

"I will take molds of bodies, sculpt out objects, collect materials, paint details, punch tiny hairs into silicones, partially destroy my past artworks, and then arrange the parts together. I use lighting to further refine and focus the intentions of the piece. Every detail has meaning to me. I then take a picture of the piece and subtly swing the color until there is a harmony within the image. Each image that has emotional significance to me has a sound to it. It could be a buzzing, crackling, or distant humming sound. It's different for every piece."

In film, horror creeps up on you before the mask is revealed and the blood and guts spilled. With images, however, time operates differently. The horror hits all at once, ready or not, and how long the viewer stays around to ogle the carnage is up to her. 

But long before horror became a genre foremost experienced on the screen, artists were harnessing their bodily angst into contorted renderings of monsters and mutants that look, at their core, human but not. In the 15th century, Hieronymous Bosch visualized a sweaty, crowded purgatory packed with naked bodies and mismatched parts, wayward eyeballs, gaping mouths that morph into other bodily cavities, fingers that claw and lips that howl without sound. 

In the 20th century, painters like Francis Bacon conducted surgery with a paintbrush, unhinging flesh from skull and making a mess out of both. Using the body as his starting point, Bacon transmogrifies skin into smoke, into ink, into skin again, this time exposed and flipped inside out. 

And then there is Sitkin, whose three-dimensional constructions feature familiar elements -- hair and teeth and ears and nails -- chopped up and spit back out as if by a serial killer with a cubist bent. Smoke billows from sockets where eyes should be and blood is the color of black ink. The lingering imprint of her striking images last way longer than the typical hour-and-a-half movie runtime. 

From 15th century triptychs to contemporary slasher flicks, much of horror in cinema or on canvas stems back to the unshakeable feeling of being uncomfortable in your own skin. "I feel a real disharmony with my body," Sitkin said. "Just having a body at all. It feels very alien to me, I don't really care for the design of it. I am a sentient being, my body is both my means and demise. I would like to escape the confines of having a human form."

Have you ever looked in the mirror and recognized only most of what looked back? Dive into all your bodily heebie-jeebies with a look at Sitkin's most haunting works below. 

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What's the best way to take down the patriarchy? You can subvert it. Confront it. Overturn it. Or, you can take a cue from the League of Lady Wrestlers and you can leapfrog body guillotine that patriarchy into a bloody pulp.

Meet The Stinker, Helga Hysteria, and Doughnut Messaround -- just some of the badass dames who, as a pastime, pummel each other, glitter and all. They're the League of Lady Wrestlers, an amateur crew of female-identifying badasses who throw down in the name of feminism. 

Earlier this month, the princesses of pain kicked ass at the The Island Rumble II, an evening of destruction held at Toronto's Artscape Gibraltar Point. In the event that you missed it, Toronto-based photographer Aaron Wynia was there to capture the most bruised-up, knocked-out moments. 

"I had no idea what the League of Lady Wrestlers was until my friend Erin informed and invited me a couple days beforehand," Wynia explained to The Huffington Post. "I was immediately allured at the idea of their costumes. I imagined a lot of glitter, latex and wild makeup. Inevitably I thought how great it would be to make images of the whole thing."

Fluorescent wigs, metallic unitards, intergalactic face paint and bulging muscles take center stage as the babely deliverers of pain grapple with gender stereotypes and, occasionally, suffocate an opponent via a yeast-infected crotch.

All hail the League of Lady Wrestlers. Regardless of who took home the trophy that night, they're all winners. Check out the night's raucous festivities with Wynia's captivating photos below. 

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