Harmony in Blue and Gold: The story of the Peacock Room

Happy Thursday loves!! I do hope your week has gone well so far, full of joy and good times. I will be enjoying the October weekend, I do love this season & may be I'll go out to kick the leaves around and enjoy the colours of nature, even if it rains. One must walk in the rain at least once in life, it's quite refreshing. I leave you with one of my utmost favourite rooms ever...The Peacock Room! As you may have guessed I adore Peacocks and their amazing colours. And this room is a dream, I hope to one day travel to see it in real life and enjoy it's sensuous atmosphere to the fullest. Please don't feel you have to read it all word for word, just enjoy the pictures, I've linked all that I could for those like me, enjoy researching more and learning things :) Enjoy & have a wonderful and decadent day and weekend to come!!

All love, peace & cupcakes

♥

La Princesse du pays de la porcelaine, 1863-64, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil on canvas, 199.9 x 116.1 cm. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1903.91

The Peacock Room was at one time the dining room in the London home of Frederick R. Leyland. He was a wealthy shop owner from Liverpool, England. It was originally designed by a very gifted interior architect named Thomas Jeckyll. He wanted to better display Leyland's prized collection of Chinese porcelain at it's best, so constructed a lattice of intricately carved shelving and hung antique gilded leather on the walls. A painting by James Abott McNeill Whistler called "La Princesse du pays de la porcelaine - or The Princess from the Land of Porcelain", occupied a place of honour above the fireplace.

Mr. Jeckyll had nearly completed his commission when he consulted Whistler (who had been working on decorations for the entrance to the Leyland's house) in regards to the colour of the paint to use on the dining room shutters and doors. Having great concern that the red roses on the leather hangings would clash with the colours in the painting, Whistler volunteered to retouch the walls with the traces of yellow; Leyland permitted him to make these changes and to also adorn the wainscoting and cornice with a wave pattern. Assuming the decoration of the room would have been complete, Leyland went back to his business in Liverpool.

Central shutters on the east side of Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, 1876-77, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil paint and metal leaf on leather, canvas, and wood, 4.2 x 10 x 6 m. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1904.61

Detail of the central shutters on the east side of Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, 1876-77, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil paint and metal leaf on leather, canvas, and wood, 4.2 x 10 x 6 m. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1904.61

While the patron was away, Whistler decided to play ; ) He was inspired to go even bolder in his revisions. He brought in Dutch metal or imitation gold leaf and covered the ceiling in it. Over that, he painted a lush pattern of peacock feathers (can you see why this room is my favourite yet!?!) He then went on to gild Jeckyll's walnut shelving and make embellishments on the wooden shutters with four magnificent and stunning plumed peacocks. Whistler wrote to Leyland that the dining room had come alive with beauty, brilliant and gorgeous while at the same time keeping it's delicate and refined nature to the last degree. He urged Leyland not to return to London yet, as he wanted every detail to be perfect before being seen. 

Portrait of Whistler, 1897, by Paul Cesar Helleu (French, 1859-1927). Drypoint, 33.6 x 25.3 cm. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1897.103

Arrangement in Black: Portrait of F.R. Leyland by James McNeill Whistler, 1870-73. Oil on canvas, 192.8 x 91.9 cm. Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1905.100

Yet, instead of this, Whistler decided to use the time to entertain visitors and amuse the press in the lavishly decorated room - all without the permission of the owner, so you know! His audacious behaviour combined with a dispute over payment brought about a bitter quarrel between the painter and his patron. Leyland would not pay Whistler the two thousand guineas that Whistler wanted, especially when he was using his home for other entertaining purposes. But, eventually he agreed - but to only half that amount and further insulted Whistler by writing his check in pounds. 

Southeast corner of Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, 1876-77, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil paint and metal leaf on leather, canvas, and wood, 4.2 x 10 x 6 m. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1904.61

Detail: South wall mural of Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, 1876-77, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil paint and metal leaf on leather, canvas, and wood, 4.2 x 10 x 6 m. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1904.61

Maybe in retaliation, Whistler took the liberty in coating Leyland's valuable leather with Prussian-blue paint and depicted a pair of peacocks fighting aggressively with each other on the wall opposite The Princess painting. He used two shades of gold for the design & highlighted the details in silver. At the feet of the angry birds are scattered coins (silver shillings) that Leyland refused to pay. The silver feathers on the peacock's throat allude to the ruffled shits that Leyland always wore. This poor and affronted peacock with a silver crest feather was to resemble the lock of white hair that curled above Whistler's forehead. To make sure that Leyland understood his point, Whistler called the mural of these fighting peacocks "Art and the Money or, The Story of the Room." He got his hands on a blue rug to complete the scheme and titled the room "Harmony in Blue and Gold." Once completing this room in 1877, he never saw it again!

Whistler's Peacock Room, Chicago Sunday Tribune, 4 September 1904

Whistler's Peacock Room, Chicago Sunday Tribune, 4 September 1904

Even with all the controversy around the creation of this room, Leyland kept it as Whistler left it and continued on filling the shelves with porcelain until he died in 1892. Twelve years after, the Peacock Room was removed from the Leyland house and put on exhibition in a London art gallery. Charles Lang Freer (1852-1919) having recently acquired The Princess from the Land of Porcelain, who later founded the Freer Gallery of Art, purchased the Peacock Room in 1904. The room was again taken apart and reinstalled in an addition to Freer's house in Detroit, Michigan. It was used for the display of his own collection of ceramics. Freer recognised the importance of the Peacock room in understanding Whistler's style. And also he believed it to exemplify the spirit of universal beauty that upheld his philosophy of collecting & united his Asian and American art.

Detail: Southwest corner of Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, 1876-77, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil paint and metal leaf on leather, canvas, and wood, 4.2 x 10 x 6 m. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1904.61

Southwest corner of Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room, 1876-77, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil paint and metal leaf on leather, canvas, and wood, 4.2 x 10 x 6 m. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1904.61

After Freer pasted away in 1919, the Peacock Room was once again transported. This time to Washington, D.C. and installed in the new Freer Gallery of Art. But, because of being moved so many times, the room's physical structure had become unstable. Between 1947 and 1950, two Boston restorers, John and Richard Finlayson carried out very extensive renovations, they seemed to concentrated most of their work on the painted panels and disregarded the surrounding framework of wainscoting, even though Whistler himself lavished on details. Sadly, this lost the subtle harmonies of the work. 

Fortunately, Whistler's intricate patterns of colour design were able to be successfully retrieved. A team removed the accumulated darkened varnish to leave the original greenish gold. The dark lustreless ceiling became vibrant again with feather patterns across a shimmering gold ground. Once this conservation was complete, the inspiration for the colour scheme became clear, the coppery golds, brilliant blues and greens of Whistler's decoration resembled that of the stunning feathers of the peacock! 

La Princesse du pays de la porcelaine, 1863-64, by James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834-1903). Oil on canvas, 199.9 x 116.1 cm. Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1903.91

Going even further to restore the harmony of The Peacock Room, the Freer Gallery went on to collect examples of Chinese blue and white porcelain very similar to those which the room was designed. Frederick Leyland's collection consisted of Oing-dynasty pieces, primarily from the Kangxi period (1662-1722), in a wide ranges of shapes and sizes, as suggested by the variety of spaces formed by Jeckyll's elaborate walnut framework. The cobalt-blue peacock feathers, which lay almost invisible before the conservation work, appear in all their glory on the walls behind the shelves. As a result of this conservation, Whistler's Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room is once again what the artist intended, a whimsical land of porcelain ruled by the princess in the painting!

♥