9 - The Last Wunderkammer: Curiosities in Private Collections between the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 June 2021
Summary
Abstract
In his description of the magnificent Vanderbilt collection located on Fifth Avenue in New York, Earl Shinn pointed out the presence of a medieval Venetian ivory casket in the Japanese parlor. Wonder serves as the guiding principle for the display of objects selected according to their provenance and for their very different chronologies. In this context, eclecticism concerns more than a mere display of heterogeneous artifacts, it is a way to create resplendent interiors and to allow visitors sink into a sense of wonder. This chapter reconsiders the key concepts of curiosity and eclecticism, not just as a fashion or as display modes, but as new steps in the long-term history of the Wunderkammer.
Keywords: art collecting, curiosity, Wunderkammer , eclecticism, art Market
In 1883, Edward Strahan (the pseudonym of Earl Shinn), one of the keenest observers of the emerging American fashion for collecting during the period known as the Gilded Age, published an important book on the collection of the wealthy magnate William H. Vanderbilt. Among various art objects, Strahan noted a small “ivory hexagonal casket,” simply referring to as a work of “Italian taste of the Giotto period” but without any additional details. This small ivory artifact was situated in the “Japanese parlor” (Fig. 9.1.) of Vanderbilt's house on Fifth Avenue in New York, which was home to one of the most important American collections of the period. Interestingly, Strahan did not disapprove of this casket's position, even though it was apparently out of sync with both the historical period of the cabinet and, more importantly, the geographical setting. He considered this to be entirely coherent, insofar as the room in question had a special identity. In the progression of rooms making up the Vanderbilt mansion, opulently depicted in the book's numerous images, this particular room served as a sort of chamber of curiosities. In fact, the words “curiosity” or “curiosities” appear repeatedly in this part of his description:
The curiosities which find a shelter in this room are of the most varied kinds, -lacquers, cloisonné enamels, bronzes, potteries; as a rule, they are of Oriental origin, as befits the local genius of the place.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Ephemeral Spectacles, Exhibition Spaces and Museums1750–1918, pp. 253 - 272Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2021