The W.H. asked the Guggenheim to “borrow” a Van Gogh painting for Trump’s private living quarters.
The curator denied the request, offering instead an 18-karat, fully functioning, solid gold toilet — an interactive work entitled “America,” WaPo reports. https://t.co/FaZ1BwIAH4
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 25, 2018
The Guggenheim — it’s getting more and more noticed, you might have heard — is a tremendously classy museum, founded on a rich celebrity’s personal relationships with all the best people. Being courted by the Guggenheim, getting on their board, is a well-established marker of HAVING MADE IT in New York society. Donald J. Trump is *never* going to get that golden ticket… and if I know New Yorkers, he will never be allowed to forget this 18-carat insult…
The emailed response from the Guggenheim’s chief curator to the White House was polite but firm: The museum could not accommodate a request to borrow a painting by Vincent Van Gogh for President and Melania Trump’s private living quarters.
Instead, wrote the curator, Nancy Spector, another piece was available, one that was nothing like “Landscape With Snow,” the 1888 Van Gogh rendering of a man in a black hat walking along a path in Arles, France, with his dog.
The curator’s alternative: an 18-karat, fully functioning, solid gold toilet — an interactive work titled “America” that critics have described as pointed satire aimed at the excess of wealth in this country.
For a year, the Guggenheim had exhibited “America” — the creation of contemporary artist Maurizio Cattelan — in a public restroom on the museum’s fifth floor for visitors to use.
But the exhibit was over and the toilet was available “should the President and First Lady have any interest in installing it in the White House,” Spector wrote in an email obtained by The Washington Post.
The artist “would like to offer it to the White House for a long-term loan,” wrote Spector, who has been critical of Trump. “It is, of course, extremely valuable and somewhat fragile, but we would provide all the instructions for its installation and care.”…
Cattelan, reached by phone in New York, referred questions about the toilet to the Guggenheim, saying with a chuckle, “It’s a very delicate subject.” Asked to explain the meaning of his creation and why he offered it to the Trumps, he said: “What’s the point of our life? Everything seems absurd until we die and then it makes sense.”
He declined to reveal the cost of the gold it took to create “America,” though it has been estimated to have been more than $1 million…
Trump is certainly more capable of appreciating a solid-gold toilet than a genuine Van Gogh. And, yes, I suspect that once the original was in his sweaty little hands, it would never have been seen again… except by those individuals lucky enough to visit some Russian oligarch’s dacha.
JGabriel
And The 2018 Troll of the Year Award goes to …
JGabriel
Anne Laurie @ Top:
Or a black market art auction.
Villago Delenda Est
I love this slap in the orange kisser.
So appropriate for a shithole like Donald.
Baud
If I had artistic talent, I’d paint a picture of Trump on his golden throne.
Arclite
LOL. That’s hilarious. Funny thing is that the toilet is totally Trump’s style, and he’d accept it at face value, not realizing it was satire.
Mary G
In other piggish men news, Casey Affleck won’t present the Oscar to the best actress this year. Good.
mai naem mobile
Many many people did not know that the Guggenheim has very expensive art. Very expensive art that very rich people can afford.
Umm, would anybody trust Crooked Donnie to return the Van Gogh after his term is over? I wouldn’t . I fully expect the grifter family to grab some historical pieces when theu get their asses kicked out of the WH.
ruemara
@mai naem mobile: I think we need an audit post-Trump.
Cermet
Can anyone top telling the orange fart cloud he is so full of shit? That museum is certainly the best and get my vote. Classy, but requires a certain level of low brow insult that even a tRump voter could, maybe understand.
SiubhanDuinne
What you did there was seen. And appreciated!
Felanius Kootea
Damn the Guggenheim’s troll game is strong!
B.B.A.
You mean he hasn’t already got one?
Then again, can you really have too many solid gold toilets?
eemom
See, I would have said he thinks the toilet IS a genuine Van Gogh.
Roger Moore
I saw this, and I have to applaud the Guggenheim’s taste and judgment. They have Trump’s character nailed.
Corner Stone
If I were the artist I would rename it as, “Throne of the American Shithole President”.
Corner Stone
Tweety just said his dad was worried about “animation” taking jobs away from people like him.
The dude is not mentally well.
Roger Moore
Strictly speaking, though, it’s only 75% gold. It would only be solid gold if it were 24K.
MomSense
@Baud:
Id rather see that portrait done by someone without artistic talent.
Villago Delenda Est
@Corner Stone: By “the dude” you mean Tweety, of course.
SiubhanDuinne
@Corner Stone:
“The Royal Flush” might also work.
BTW and O/T, I saw a couple of nights ago how elegantly you skewered my pompous pet peeve pedantry. Nicely done, and I regret only that I didn’t see/respond to it until the entire world was asleep!
chris
Gold’s pretty soft, I wonder if it would support the 239 pound president. There’s an image I didn’t need to see.
ThresherK
If I loaned that to Trump, would all the Sanitized for Your Protection wrappers in the world reassure me it came back clean?
SiubhanDuinne
@eemom:
Vincent Van Gold.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@mai naem mobile: I actually went and saw every exhibit the Guggenheim had at the time back in July 2012.
And the thing that infuriates me most about Trump’s tackiness is that he isn’t even hood rich.
Roger Moore
@chris:
Gold is soft when it’s very pure. This is 18K, which has been alloyed with enough other metal (usually silver, IIRC) to give it better mechanical properties. The toilet in question was actually installed as a functioning toilet in the Guggenheim Museum, so it’s been tested under tougher conditions than it would get in the White House. That said, even 24K gold would probably be strong enough to support someone considerably heavier than Trump.
efgoldman
I wonder if it would even meet plumbing codes if they wanted to install it.
Jeffro
Cue donations to the Guggenheim in 3, 2, 1…
Cue Russian Twitter bots firing up for #CloseTheGuggenheim in 3, 2, 1…
Steeplejack
Oh, jeez. Tweety drops a clanger. Talking with Jason Johnson of The Root about changes in business and industry:
He said he was going to talk about this at the end of the show. I hope somebody tells him it’s automation.
I feel a little bad making fun of Chris Matthews for a slip of the tongue, but he is such a self-important blowhard that in the end I couldn’t resist. Mea culpa.
Cacti
The subtlety will sail right over Trump’s head and he’ll think:
“Neato! A gold toilet!”
Corner Stone
@Villago Delenda Est: Matthews just forgot the name of Elian Gonzales and called him that Cuban kid in the closet, pulled out at gun point.
WaterGirl
@Baud: That’s okay, you can just wait until the weekend when one of the political cartoons does it for you.
Roger Moore
@ThresherK:
You could autoclave the whole thing just to be sure. Gold can handle heat just fine.
Marcopolo
I think the best part of the story is it breaking when Trumpleskin is in Davos. Have to believe that no small number of those “elites” he is trying to be a part of won’t be pointing & sniggering at him the entire time.
WaterGirl
@SiubhanDuinne: I don’t get it. ?
different-church-lady
Yeah? Yeah? And did Trump take the toliet?
Shana
I saw the article a little while ago and sent it to my art historian daughter. Thought she’d appreciate it.
different-church-lady
@Steeplejack:
I hope nobody does — let’s see how many years we can keep this going.
different-church-lady
@Jeffro: We’re at the point where someone might try to set it on fire.
different-church-lady
@Roger Moore:
Are you aware of how much crap comes out of that man?
Cacti
@Marcopolo:
I think the Davos crowd is feeling more smug than usual about how Trump almost singlehandedly torpedoed the European neofascist political parties.
Their countries watched the train wreck from afar and thought that maybe handing the keys of government to friends of Dotard wasn’t such a great idea.
chris
@Roger Moore: I know but facts take the fun out of it.
The other image would be the man trying to take it with him when he’s running for the chopper ahead of the torchbearing mob. Thing must be incredibly heavy.
different-church-lady
@SiubhanDuinne:
Last one out of the thread, please turn the lights off.
Corner Stone
@Marcopolo:
They love Trump. He’s ignorant, lazy, bigoted. And the most easily rolled “negotiator” in US history. An easy target of derision and you only need one weird trick to get whatever deal you want from him.
Mary G
@SiubhanDuinne: You should be a front pager. I am always in awe of your wordplay.
Villago Delenda Est
@Steeplejack: Tweety has a very low tumbrel manifest number. Low, as in the first wave of basket cases to be created.
Steeplejack
@WaterGirl:
It’s the Frederick Douglass meme. Trump:
chopper
just tiled a laundry room floor and ach, mine back. enough with this farkakte remodel.
Steeplejack
WTF? Matthews didn’t say anything about automation or industry. He just Bannoned himself yet again about his Bobby Kennedy book.
jl
Trump could ask to borrow one from Dutch museum. Hell, then he could go for a Rembrandt and a Vermeer too. But from what I’ve read today about Dutch being a prime source for Trump/Russian intelligence, he’d have to check the pix for bugs.
chopper
@different-church-lady:
a public toilet tons of regular scumbags like you and me have used? hell fucking no.
NotMax
Would have returned it (collect) along with an insulting note (“Dear Jewseum”) upon discovering it isn’t painted on black velvet and doesn’t picture dogs playing poker.
efgoldman
@different-church-lady:
No, I don’t, and I’d prefer not to find out
Steeplejack
Based on the original Renoir that Trump has on his private plane, which is also inexplicably in a museum in Chicago, the Guggenheim should just send him a nicely framed Van Gogh print from the museum gift shop and tell him it’s the real thing. Everybody will be happy.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
so… um….. This apparently happened last June
ETA: I wonder who’s leaking?
Corner Stone
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Welp. There it is.
MomSense
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Wow.
PsiFighter37
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: IOKIYAR. Imagine if news had come out that Clinton wanted to fire Ken Starr back in the day.
lamh36
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Wow…look at Maggie H trying to get on the right side of history? Or has she given up on “access journalism”?
FYI, she’s on AC360 via phone right now.
Ken
How does a museum set up security for such an exhibit? You can’t exactly have a guard or even a camera standing over a toilet that’s supposed to be used, but without some kind of monitoring anyone with a pocketknife could carve off a chunk.
Cheryl Rofer
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It’s good that a lawyer who works for Trump retains faint vestiges of his training.
danielx
That painting is great because it’s a Van Gogh. It ought to be mine. It should be mine! It IS mine! I just have to get it from those people who have actually been letting the proles sit it!
Ken
@Steeplejack: Why waste a salable print? Just print out a 640×480 gif on cheap copy paper with a color inkjet printer.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Cheryl Rofer: Chris Hayes says it would’ve been a “presidency ending move”. I wish I could believe that.
mainmata
@ruemara: This is actually done anyway. Trump despises the WH for lack of shitty bling so it’s not like he’s going to take anything whenever he leaves. Besides his next home will be Fort Leavenworth or Sing-Sing, depending upon which charge he is brought up on.
Redshift
@mai naem mobile:
He can get tips from Sarah Huckleberry Sanders, whose extremely greedy dad apparently did his best to loot the Arkansas governor’s mansion when he moved out.
SiubhanDuinne
@Steeplejack:
But, but, I don’t want Trump to be happy!
Redshift
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. The entire GOP has made it clear they’re willing to sell out the country to Russia for tax cuts and power, so it’s hard to imagine anything being so bad they’d turn on Trump.
Shana
@chopper: But it will be so nice when it’s done. Repeat as necessary.
SiubhanDuinne
@WaterGirl:
Sometime last year, I think for Black History Month (February), Trump said something really AWK-WARD about Frederick Douglass and how “he was being recognized more and more” — as though FD were currently alive and only just coming into his own. Our AL, I think, was having a bit of after-the-fact fun with that.
The Lodger
@different-church-lady: Hey, when you gotta Gogh, you gotta Gogh…
Iron City
@Redshift: Did Mike H get both the junk pickup truck and the tire swing from the front yard?
The Lodger
@Redshift: Was that the actual governor’s mansion or the triple-wide they used during the renovation?
SiubhanDuinne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
You say this in a toilet thread??!!
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
I suspect I am far from the only one here giving pious thanks that you have no artistic talent.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ken:
Like the “original” Renoir on his private plane?
Anne Laurie
@chris:
If you read the whole article, the “interactive” toilet has been stress-tested, by a whole parade of Guggenheim-goers who waited in line for the chance.
The reporter was rude enough to say that the thought of second-hand contact with all those randos might be the only thing keeping germophobe Trump from accepting the offer!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@SiubhanDuinne: Maybe Betty Cracker will see this as a challenge. I think her style is well-suited to the subject
Anne Laurie
@SiubhanDuinne:
Y’know, that’s why I privately suspect one of Trump’s ‘backers’ personally requested he “borrow” this particular piece.
All Lord Smallgloves knows about art is that a really top-notch work has brag value, because it’s worth so much money. That’s why, IMO, the idiot lie about that Renoir copy — because it was an expensive, hand-done copy, he figured it was worth “upselling” as the original, since he could bully most people who saw it into “accepting” his personal valuation. (After a few years, he might actually have convinced himself that he *had* the original, and all those museum people were just lying to inflate their own painting’s worth.)
But the requested Van Gogh is not one of the reproductions-available-in-every-atelier pieces, is it? I have an image of some kleptocrat bragging to his fellows: Watch this — I can make the Americanski puppet take a masterpiece right out of one of the world’s great museums, and deliver it here for my pleasure!
And Donny Dollhands would eagerly comply… either because he’s wholly owned, or because he’s deluded himself that it wouldn’t matter to the museum any more than it would matter to him whether a particular piece was ‘real’ or just ‘certified’.
SiubhanDuinne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Are we talking wine-bottle foil, or butter sculpture? Or p’raps
multi-media? I do agree that B to the Crack is fully equipped to tackle any artistic challenge!
Tenar Arha
@B.B.A.:
? It’s only 14K plate
Steeplejack (phone)
@SiubhanDuinne:
Big picture, big picture! Work with me here.
I’m not sure Trump can truly know happiness, but everyone else will be ROFL.
different-church-lady
@Anne Laurie:
Which is what makes it such a brilliant troll on the part of the Guggenheim.
SiubhanDuinne
@Anne Laurie:
I just wish I could be alive in 25 years, when all the great caper movies about the Diminutive Digit and his “art collection” will be box-office smashes.
ET
@JGabriel: that is gold medal winning trolling.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mary G:
Thank you very kindly for the lovely compliment, but gods forbid. We’re all much better off with my being an erratic commenter.
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack: Ah, got it! thanks
Jinchi
I find it hard to believe that a man with the tacky taste of D. Trump doesn’t already own a gold toilet.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@Jinchi: Surely gold-plated at most. He’s too cheap to pay for actual gold. I doubt he’d even pay for gold plating; more likely iron pyrite.
Amir Khalid
@Steeplejack:
Very late reply. But I suppose one could say that animation does take work away from movie and TV actors …
Steeplejack (phone)
@Amir Khalid:
Heh. True.
NatashaWhilk
@efgoldman: According to the article, it was available for use in the museum’s restroom for a while, so probably.
Annie
I’m surprised either Dolt45 or Melania know who Van Gogh was.