alternativeartifactspodcast-blog

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2 - The Peacock Room & Filthy Lucre

Image Credit

This week’s episode explores the unique story behind two related objects: The Peacock Room and Filthy Lucre. 

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Resources Used (in order of reference)

The Peacock Room Comes to America

The Peacock Room in Blue and White

The Story Behind the Peacock Room’s Princess

Filthy Lucre

Filthy Lucre Events

The Peacock Room: REMIX

Smithsonian Press Release on Filthy Lucre

The Making of Filthy Lucre This Far Blog Post 

Further Readings

Washington Post on Sackler Family

Forbes on the Louvre

Time on the Louvre

Observer on Sackler Family

Smithsonian Video on Peacock Room: REMIX

For show notes, keep reading.

Greetings and welcome to Alternative Artifacts, a museum in your ear, the podcast that explores the strange stories behind the most unique objects in museum’s collections. Ever wonder how a gigantic Naked George Washington ended up in the American History Museum? Or why there is an entire museum dedicated to art made from human hair? Now you can listen to the stories of America’s most iconic objects from your favorite exhibit or from the comfort of your own home. My name is Lexi and I will be your tour guide. 

[Transition Music]

As mentioned in our previous episode, this season is focused on the Smithsonian Institution. Throughout this season, some of the object’s stories we explore will expose the complicated, colonial history of the Institution, some will reveal how museum methods effect objects, and others will provide a glimpse into the lives of objects beyond the confines of the museum. Today’s objects represent a cross-section of these topics.

What do you picture when you picture an artifact? Is it something manmade or natural? Does it fit inside a breadbox? Or could it be an entire room? Today’s first object is in fact, an entire room. If you ever visit the Freer|Sackler Gallery in Washington, D.C., you will notice that one gallery sets itself apart from the rest. You see, the gallery itself is a piece of art. This work of art is The Peacock Room, a decadent, excessive expression of wealth which is sometimes home to rotating displays of Chinese porcelain and has occasionally been left empty to accent its own artistic prowess. 

[Transition Music]

The history of The Peacock Room is complex. It is a story fit for a historical drama, entangled by conflicts over money, creativity, and presentation. Frederick R. Leyland was a rich shipping tycoon of nineteenth century England. His personal hobby was collecting Chinese porcelain. Frederick displayed this vast collection of porcelain in his dining room. On one wall of the dining room, he presented his most beloved possession and the focal point of his home, a painting by James McNeill Whistler called The Princess from the Land of Porcelain. This painting was a fitting accent to the vases and bowls which surrounded it. The painting depicts a Western woman dressed in traditional Chinese clothing.

Eventually, Leyland’s collection outgrew his current dining room. In order to design a new display place for his collection, Leyland commission the architect Thomas Jeckyll to update his space. Considering the importance of Whistler’s painting in the overall aesthetic of the room, Jeckyll decided to ask the artist to work alongside him. In particular, Jeckyll was hoping Whistler could provide guidance on what color scheme would best suit the painting that Leyland saw as the focal point of the room. However, in the middle of the project Leyland left London for a trip, and shortly after, Jeckyll fell ill. With Leyland abroad and Jeckyll unable to work, Whistler gained total control of the design of the room. Going beyond his duties of assigning colors, he began to develop intricate details for the room, including designing the golden bird patterns which would later give the room its infamous name. Returning from his ventures, Leyland arrived to his home and instead of a classy new dining room found a goody, overdone art project, with a price tag far higher than he initially proposed. When Leyland refused to pay Whistler the full commission for the extra work he had completed by his own will, the angry artist just kept adding even more gold-gilded birds to the wall of the dining room. In a flash of rage, Whistler painted two shimmering, gold peacocks, mid-battle, on the wall directly opposing The Princess from the Land of Porcelain. This duel of featherful fates was a metaphor for the tension between Leyland and Whistler. The artist titled this portion of the room Art and Money; or the Story of the Room. Or as I like to call it, “You are tearing me apart Leyland.”

In 1904, Charles Lang Freer, a Whistler collector who had already purchased The Princess from the Land of Porcelain, purchased the rest of the Peacock Room. He had the room dismantled, packed, shipped across the sea, delivered to his home in Detroit, and reassembled, reuniting the princess and her peacocks. Over time, Freer filled the room with his own personal collection of ceramics from Japan, Korea, China, Iran, and Syria, a collection which would later become the permanent collection of the Smithsonian’s Freer Gallery museum. When the Freer Gallery of Art was first opened in 1923, the Peacock Room was installed as a permanent exhibit, serving both as an art piece and as a place to display artifacts. The Freer has been its home ever since. But in 2014, the Peacock Room, for the first time, was forced to face its own reflection.

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You walk into a room of red light and melted gold. You feel a shiver run down your spine. It appears as if the darkness itself has weight. An eerie familiarity lurks between the rows and rows of broken vases, each painted a unique shade and pattern. They crack and crumble, many of them barely remaining on the shelves. Some of them have already reached the floor, leaving traces of their former form in a smashed trail behind them. The emotion invoked here begs you to ask, “Where have I seen this before?” From behind the walls and under the floors, the sounds of womens’ voices and strange, distant music echo. They whisper, “I am a thing of beauty.” Or is it the mysterious painting of the faceless woman, the one in the kimono, is she whispering? A red light blares behind closed shutters on the wall, like blood emerging from a fresh wound. Above you, two huge birds vie in a life or death battle, their golden wings outstretched. They seem to tear at each other's guts, both beautiful and tragic with their intricate and shining feathers. With your eyes, you trace the melted gold which runs down from this image and across the hardwood, reflecting the red rays in the false windows. This piece is not just a feast for the eyes. Rather, it is an experience for the whole body. This is Filthy Lucre, a twisted, modern update of The Peacock Room.

Filthy Lucre is the modern piece which serves as an in-depth commentary of the role of wealth, art, and power in both modern and historical contexts, using the original Peacock Room and it’s story as a guide. Filthy Lucre is Darren Waterston’s dynamic response to the Peacock Room. In Waterson’s vision of the infamous piece, he uses artistic metaphors to demonstrate how the tensions developed by the creation of the intricate room represent the social tensions of modern America. For example, the melting gold which runs through the desk, onto the floor and even outside the room, represents the “Gilded Age,” in simple terms a time when things seem to be going quite well, but underneath it all they are corrupt. An age “gilded in gold”. Not only does Waterson intend to reference the Gilded Age of the nineteenth century, but he also intends to evoke conversations about the modern Gilded Age in which we live now and use the historical time period as a metaphor. 

Filthy Lucre serves as both metaphor and commentary, connecting images from the past to issues of the present. In 1876, Whistler saw Leyland as a crook for hoarding his excessive amounts of money and refusing to pay for the painter’s services. This act was a microcosm to the state of the world economy during this era. As more nations were industrializing in the nineteenth century, it seemed the rich grew richer and the poor grew poorer. Waterson effectively paralleled the image of the Gilded Age to today through the visual cues his piece. When you see gold running down the wall and onto the floor, you may pause to think of the exuberant spendings of the wealthy in our society. These lavish purchases, much like gold melting along the floor, hide the dark modern issues surrounding how money is acquired. Beyond the visual cues in the room, sounds make a strong stance for Waterson’s themes. The voices and music in this room come from three women who call themselves BETTY. Generating a score for the room, they use ambient electric string instruments and they repeat the mantra “I am a thing of beauty,” which they speak eerily and haphazardly. This draws in the visitor, both with fear and curiosity. In the context of the room, the sounds continue to convey a theme of the destruction and distortion caused by wealth. Just as the melting gold and broken vases conjure images of wealthy negligence, the whispers of women convey vanity, a trait often associated with the rash decisions of the wealthy. 

In a modern world plagued by hunger, homelessness, and poverty, the rich still grow richer and the poor still grow poorer. In this way, Waterson compares the state of the world which inspired Whistler’s artistic vision to the state of our modern world. The artist presents a dominant theme of negativity towards those who choose to hoard excessive wealth, even at great cost to the poor. This theme directly connects to the title of the piece “Filthy Lucre,” which is a term literally meaning “money, especially when gained in a dishonorable way.”  

Interestingly enough, the title and meaning of Filthy Lucre itself directly relates to a very current issue in the museum industry: the issue of  museums taking money from philanthropists who earned their fortunes in an unsavory way. Arthur M. Sackler, for whom the Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian is named for, is a member of the Sackler family. It has recently come to light in the museum community that the Sackler family’s Pharmaceutical business was heavily involved in the sale and spread of an addictive pain killing drug in the United States, which has lead to the death of many Americans. For this reason, protestors have asked many institutions including the Met, the Louvre, and the Smithsonian to erase the Sackler name. The Louvre was the first to fully remove the name, but the Smithsonian has asserted they will not be removing the name for the foreseeable future. If you are curious for more details, please review this week’s further readings that I believe show a broad scope of details surrounding the issue and address it in a much more thorough manner than I am possibly capable of.

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Unfortunately, you can no longer see Filthy Lucre, which was on display at the Smithsonian Freer|Sackler Gallery as part of an exhibition called “Peacock Room:REmix” from 2014 to 2017. Currently, there is no set date for another exhibition of Filthy Lucre, but photos of the piece are available on the artist’s website darrenwaterston.com. You can, however, view the Peacock Room daily from 10am - 5:30pm at the Freer|Sackler Gallery, 1050 Independence Ave SW, Washington, DC. The current display featured in The Peacock Room is called “The Peacock Room in Blue and White” and it is a collection of Chinese ceramics, representative of how the room looked in the 1870s when Leyland was the owner. The Peacock Room shutters are open every third Thursday from noon to 5pm. Viewing the room with the shutters open provides a whole new perspective, allowing visitors to see the way the natural sunlight accents the colors of the space. In extreme weather, the shutters are not opened.

Now, the museum tip of the week. Missing the sticker activity books of your childhood? Love museums? Check out Stickertopia: The Museum by Quintet Publishing Company. The book is avaliable for $7.89 at Barnes and Noble, and you can check for local availability on their website. Stickertopia and Barnes and Noble are not sponsors or anything, I just am an adult who loves sticker books and appreciates cool design and I wanted to share something that makes me happy with all of you.

Want to learn more? Show notes including sources, further reading, links to cool stuff and podcast transcripts for each episode are available through our tumblr, alternativeartifactspodcast.tumblr.com. Alternative Artifacts is hosted through Anchor.fm, a free hosting service for podcasts of all kinds. You can subscribe to us on Anchor.fm directly or through Spotify Podcasts.  Interested in sponsoring an episode? Have an awesome idea for an episode? Want to be a guest star? Email us at alternativeartifactspodcast@gmail.com. Special thanks to Dr. Suse Anderson, whose class on Museum Ethics and Values in part inspired the form this episode took. Theme music was created by NordGroove and downloaded via Fugue. Additional Music by Dural and downloaded via Fugue. Remember, as Tommy Wiseau said, “if a lot of people love each other, the world would be a better place to live.”

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More About the Host

Lexi Simms is originally from Pennsylvania and grew up obsessing over history.

She studied Anthropology, Archaeology, and Korean Language as an undergraduate at The George Washington University. She graduated in 2019.

As a freshmen, she joined a cultural sorority which gave her the nickname “Artifact*,” probably because she is so stuck in the past. 

She has interned at the Smithsonian Libraries and the National Zoo. 

Currently Lexi, is continuing her studies at GW as a Museum Studies Graduate Student. She works part time as a Graphic Designer and Web Manager. 

When she is not exploring alternative artifacts, Lexi enjoys collecting antiques, trying new food and petting dogs.

Photo by @aex.photo (On Instagram)

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1 - Ruby Slippers

This week’s episode explores the unique story behind one of America’s most iconic and beloved objects: Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers.

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Resources Used (in order of reference)

Smithsonian History

“The Slippers” Documentary

Smithsonian Magazine

Henry Littlefield’s Piece on Allegory

American History Blog on Recovered Slippers

American History Blog on Conservation

Kickstarter Campaign

Learn More about the Ruby Slippers

Antique Roadshow Podcast

The Populist Movement in America

The Ruby Slippers of Oz

To access the transcript, click read more.

Greetings and welcome to Alternative Artifacts, a museum in your ear, the podcast that explores the strange stories behind the most unique objects in museum’s collections. Ever wonder how a gigantic Naked George Washington ended up in the National Museum of American History? Or why there is an entire museum dedicated to art made from human hair? Now you can listen to the stories of America’s most iconic objects from your favorite exhibit or from the comfort of your own home. My name is Lexi and I will be your tour guide. 

[Transition Music]

Our first season will focus on objects in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution. Founded in 1846 with funds donated by British citizen James Smithson, the Smithsonian Institution is the largest museum complex and research centers in the world, and serves as an umbrella organization managing 19 museums and a zoo. Access to all Smithsonian Institution museums is completely free to the public. Beyond these publicly accessible venues, the Smithsonian also manages dozens of research centers throughout the United States and internationally, leading scientific research and disseminating knowledge. Some of the object’s stories we explore will expose the complicated, colonial history of the Institution, some will reveal how museum methods effect objects, and others will provide a glimpse into the lives of objects beyond the confines of the museum. Today’s object falls in the last category. 

Picture this. You enter the American History museum from the bustling DC street Constitution Avenue, you will need to head upstairs to see our first artifact. This object is so famous it has its own special gift shop, instigated an investigation led by the FBI, and inspired a documentary. It is regarded as an object of cultural significance, despite being linked to no significant religious or political event. In the newest renovation of its exhibit, this object now sits on a pedestal in its own room, surrounded by walls decorated with murals that harken to the object’s origin. Poppy flowers, emerald green, a sweet little dog, a girl in a blue dress…I am talking about the Ruby Slippers. An American icon visited as often as the Star Spangled Banner and regarded by generations of movie lovers as a symbol of the American film industry. But how did these slippers become icons of American history? How did they end up property of the federal government? Why is the FBI involved in the science of their preservation? And what is the weird history behind them so few of their visitors actually know about? Today on Alternative Artifacts we investigate the Ruby Slippers. 

[Transition Music] 

In L. Frank Baum’s original book “The Wizard of Oz” the slippers that took Dorothy home were silver. Spoiler alert, if you can even spoil something that’s 119 years old. Some historical scholars argue the fact that the slippers were made of silver was meant to serve as a symbol from American politics. In the 1960s a scholar named Henry Littlefield claimed that Baum’s fairytale of a magical land called Oz was actually a satire. Littlefield argues that Baum’s experience on the prairie, which overlapped with the establishment of the Populist movement, or people’s party, in the region, was fodder for the allegory present in The Wizard of Oz. But this detailing this allegory could make an episode all its own, so for today’s episode we will only be focusing on the ruby colored slippers from the MGM film and how they came to be. 

So how did the slippers we know and love today end up ruby instead of silver? During the early stages of production for the film “The Wizard of Oz,” MGM studios had a script that mentioned the shoes being silver. However, they decided to change the color to red during a round of script edits. There were several reasons for this change, but the most significant was actually quite simple and direct. If you recall the film, the scenes in Kansas are depicted in dull, black & white. The scenes in Oz are bright and colorful. Think of the yellow brick road and the emerald city. This was a very deliberate choice made by the film studio. While the Wizard of Oz, released on August 25, 1939, was not the first major motion picture to use Technicolor technology, the use of this tech was still very new and many audiences had little exposure to color footage. Making the slippers a vibrant color made them “pop” on screen, drawing viewers attention. 

During the production of the film several pairs of the slippers were created, using commercially produced high heels which prop designers dyed red and added sequins to. There are four known surviving pairs of these original prop shoes. Today we will focus on two. First, the Smithsonian National Museum of American History is home to one pair, donated in 1979.

Another museum which possessed a pair of the shoes was the Judy Garland Museum. In 2005, their pair of Ruby Slippers went missing. They disappeared almost without a trace, with the thief leaving behind only a single red sequin. More on this later.

In 2016, the Smithsonian launched a kickstarter campaign to preserve their pair of the Ruby Slippers. Prior to this conservation, the slippers could only remain on display for short periods of time yet remained an iconic object, one visitors inquired about daily. This most recent conservation effort addressed many issues facing the aging footwear. It also included in-depth research into the properties of the materials the shoes were constructed from to better conserve them and similar objects in the future. Then, the team working to restore the slippers received an odd call from an unexpected party inquiring about their research. 

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In a plot twist straight out of Hollywood, the Ruby Slipper conservators were about to become forensic scientists. The call was from the Federal Bureau of investigation, who had in their possession a pair of Ruby Slippers recovered in a sting operation. Suddenly, the conservation had become an investigation. The FBI asked the conservators to take a look at the slippers they had confiscated and compare them to the pair from the Smithsonian’s collection. The FBI wanted to know if it was possible for their pair of shoes to be an authentic pair of Ruby Slippers, and perhaps the ones stolen 11 years prior from the Judy Garland Museum. Dawn Wallace, the conservator leading the project, compared the moment she learned that she may be helping identify the pair of stolen slippers to the Indiana Jones films. After all, it is not often a museum professional gets the chance to fight crime. 

Upon examining the FBI’s pair of slippers, Wallace knew that they were in fact an authentic pair of Dorothy’s iconic shoes. This pair of shoes was in fact so similar to the Smithsonian’s pair, it lead to another question. Why were they so similar? What Wallace noticed while trying to answer this question an even more astonishing discovery. When comparing the slippers side by side, it became clear that they were in fact mismatched pairs. The next question the team wanted to address was obvious: did the swap occur before or after filming? The evidence suggests the pairs were in fact swapped when they were made, and filmed as mismatched pairs, just as they are presented and preserved today. This conclusion is drawn from the fact that the construction patterns are similar between the matching shoes, but the wear patterns are similar between the mismatched shoes, suggesting Judy Garland wore and used them mismatched. In other words, the prop team working on the Wizard of Oz made the two pairs of shoes separately, but at some point swapped one shoe of each pair, leading to mismatched pairs being used on the set of the film.

The Ruby Slippers have developed a life beyond MGM’s production of “The Wizard of Oz” and outlived many other homages to the iconic film, including its depiction in Disney’s Great Movie Ride. They serve not only as an attraction for tourists, but as a monument to two major moments in American History: the introduction of technicolor technology to the American people and the immortalization of a wholly American fairytale. Today the Smithsonian’s pair of Ruby Slippers keep the magic alive. They can be viewed daily in their humidity and temperature controlled display case at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History at 1300 Constitution Ave NW, Washingtion DC. 

[Transition Music]

Now here’s the museum tip of the week. Did you know the Smithsonian fossil hall recently reopened after being closed for 5 years? The newly renovated exhibit features 700 fossils and tells the story of 3.7 billion years of earth’s history. The only downside is that the Natural History Museum which houses the collection is also one of the most trafficked museums on the mall. The best time to go to avoid crowds according to a local? Wait until the weather cools down. By the end of October most of the Smithsonians will clear up, but the best time to go for an almost empty museum experience is always the month of January. Happy museum travels.

Want to learn more? Show notes including sources, further reading, links to cool stuff and podcast transcripts for each episode are available through our tumblr, alternativeartifactspodcast.tumblr.com. Alternative Artifacts is hosted through Anchor.fm, a free hosting service for podcasts of all kinds. You can subscribe to us on Anchor.fm directly or through Spotify Podcasts.  Interested in sponsoring an episode? Have an awesome idea for an episode? Want to be a guest star? Email us at alternativeartifactspodcast@gmail.com. Theme music was created by NordGroove and downloaded via Fugue. The sound effects were provided by zapsplat.com. Remember, there is no place like home and never stop exploring. 

[Outro Music]