Slay. #Queen #RBG
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🧵 PROOF — COLLARS OF CONVICTION
Section: PROOF
Feature Title: COLLARS OF CONVICTION
Photographs by: Elinor Carucci
Tagline (NatGeo masthead): Looking at the Earth from every possible angle
Volume / Issue: Vol. 240, No. 3 (September 2021)
Deck (top line):
Her robe accessories were just one way Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg stood out on the high court.
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🧷 Lead Image (Opening Spread)
Object: A judicial collar
Handwritten embroidery (inside collar):
“It’s not sacrifice, it’s family”
(Quote attributed later in the story to Ginsburg’s husband, Martin.)
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📸 Collar Gallery (Grid Spread)
What’s shown:
Six individual collars photographed against a dark background, each distinct in material and form, including:
• Beaded collars (red-and-gold; metallic)
• Lace collars (delicate, floral)
• Netted / woven structures
• Spiked metal forms
• A rainbow-colored collar (explicitly noted later)
Caption summary (bottom of spread):
• Ginsburg sometimes wore:
• A vibrant red-and-gold collar, a thank-you gift from a staff member
• A white-beaded South African collar, said to be her favorite
• A spiky metal piece, worn in her first official portrait
• A gold-and-purple collar worn during Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s 2018 portrait session
• A pride collar from Ecuador, first worn in 2016
• A doll-like lace collar, a gift
(Exact phrasing condensed from the printed caption.)
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📰 THE BACKSTORY
Subhead:
On assignment at the Supreme Court, a photographer tries to do justice to a justice’s fashion trademark.
Narrative Extract (faithful summary):
• Elinor Carucci arrived at the U.S. Supreme Court to photograph Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s collars less than two months after Ginsburg’s death.
• Carucci had about six minutes per collar to make each image.
• The day before, she photographed makeshift replicas cut from paper towels.
• Her stated goal:
“to capture the vibrancy and character of the cherished Ginsburg accessories.”
She describes the experience as:
“It really was like looking at pieces of history.”
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🧵 Key Quote (Central Motif)
• The embroidered phrase “It’s not sacrifice, it’s family” comes from Martin Ginsburg, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s husband.
• Carucci explains the quote reflects Ginsburg’s layered identity:
• Wife
• Mother
• Jewish daughter of immigrants
• Second woman on the Supreme Court
Carucci notes:
“It’s something so many of us women struggle with.”
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🌈 Identity & Meaning
• Carucci, described as an Israeli immigrant and mother of a queer child, connects deeply to the collars.
• One collar in rainbow pride colors is highlighted as especially meaningful.
• The collars are described as:
“Emotional and personal and political and so many things at once.”
— Natasha Daly
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🖼️ Closing Portrait
Image: Ruth Bader Ginsburg in judicial robes with a lace collar
Caption:
Ruth Bader Ginsburg served on the high court from 1993 until her death in September 2020.
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🔎 Core Data Takeaway
• Object: Judicial collars
• Function: Personal expression within institutional constraint
• Themes:
• Identity
• Legacy
• Gender & power
• Memory
• Craft as language
• Framing: Accessories as historical documents


