The Gilded Dish: A Rienzi Blog

Rum: Sugar and the High Seas

Casey Monahan — Tue, 07 Apr 2015 14:17:49 -0500

Are you interested in the history of rum? Objects in the Rienzi Collection with connections to spirits and rum provide inspiration for our “Demon Rum” Dinner on April 29. Join us for a unique evening with bartender Bobby Heugel, from Anvil Bar & Refuge, and chef Chris Shepherd, from Underbelly. Many works in the Rienzi Collection are indicative of the surge in transcontinental trade and globalization during the 18th century. Here are two highlights that relate to rum in ways...

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Comfort: Bringing the Garden Inside

Casey Monahan — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 10:47:28 -0500

This autumn at Rienzi, Isla’s Gallery features Comfort and the Eighteenth-Century Interior. Highlighting 18th-century decorative arts and material culture, the exhibition seeks to communicate how design could improve people’s lives, both emotionally and physically, by making them more comfortable. The development of “white gold,” or porcelain, in the 18th century naturally figures into the concept of comfort. Although the material was valued for its...

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An Unexpected Provenance

Casey Monahan — Thu, 29 May 2014 12:42:54 -0500

Warwick vases were rampant in the visual and material culture of the 19th and 20th centuries. The bulky form, based on 23 ancient fragments and elaborated upon by the great “Cavalier Pasticci,” Giovanni Battista Piranesi, features bacchanalian iconography. Rienzi has three examples of Warwick vases on display; two were featured in an earlier blog. A third Warwick vase joined Rienzi’s collection in 2010. Covered Vase, made by silversmith Paul Storr for the jewelry firm...

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Good Books and Great Conversations! Part II: Rienzi Selections

Casey Monahan — Fri, 02 Aug 2013 12:27:50 -0500

Fueled by a love for reading, history, and our respective MFAH house museums, Jennifer Hammond and I decided to launch a program to share our enthusiasm with all of you! Jennifer is the director of education at Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens. The Rienzi and Bayou Bend Book Club was inaugurated in September 2011 and features books about the culture, history, and experience of the 18th and 19th centuries in America and Europe. We are always eager for new participants like you to join...

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Good Books and Great Conversations! Part I: Bayou Bend Selections

Casey Monahan — Wed, 31 Jul 2013 12:37:08 -0500

¡Buen viaje, Murillo! Part IV: A Travel Update

Casey Monahan — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 14:36:53 -0500

Last summer we blogged about the travels of one Rienzi’s paintings, The Nativity by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo. The work journeyed with Rienzi’s director, Katherine Howe, to the Museo Nactional del Prado to be part of the exhibition Murillo and Justino de Neve. The Art of Friendship. Since then, the exhibition, along with Rienzi’s painting, journeyed to Fundación Focus Abengoa in Seville, Spain, and to the Dulwich Picture Gallery in London. While the...

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A Garden in Vogue

Casey Monahan — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 14:30:10 -0600

I have nothing close to a green thumb. While I have fond memories of my dad’s vegetable garden, in the past year alone I have somehow managed to kill an assortment of herbs, succulents, and a fig tree. However, I have still retained my love for the work that those with green thumbs can do! At Rienzi, we’re in the midst of the gardens’ loveliest season, and there are a variety of camellias and azaleas in bloom. To honor Rienzi’s gardens, we chose a British garden-themed...

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A Cuppa Tea

Casey Monahan — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 13:59:32 -0600

I can’t live without a cup of coffee in the morning, but I also love a good cup of tea (my favorites are Tazo’s Zen and Stash’s Premium Green). While today tea is an incredibly popular drink, perhaps to some extent because of recent research into its varied health benefits and high antioxidant concentrations, it has an extensive social history, beyond the 1773 ruckus in Boston Harbor. Tea is a staple drink with worldwide consumption. Tea was probably initially consumed in...

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Family Ties

Casey Monahan — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 16:21:30 -0500

Inheritance: The Story of Knole and the Sackvilles chronicles a family’s nearly 400-year history of wealth, inheritance, and titles. On November 14 the Rienzi and Bayou Bend book club host discussion about the book, with a surprise appearance by a guest close to the family. The book, written by Robert Sackville-West, the 7th Lord Sackville, recounts the history of the Sackville family’s English country estate, Knole–a story of wealth, inherited titles, and the...

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Guests from Abroad: George Romney, Part II

Caroline Cole — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 12:49:43 -0500

The volume of paintings produced by George Romney in the mid-1770s through the mid-1790s, for the most prestigious members of society, surpassed any other painter at the time. Although he was a competitor of artists like Sir Joshua Reynolds and Thomas Gainsborough, Romney charged significantly less for a portrait sitting than his Royal Academy counterparts. Also, by making himself accessible to an emerging moneyed class and avoiding lofty political associations, Romney catered to a larger...

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Guests from Abroad: George Romney, Part I

Caroline Cole — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 09:54:30 -0500

George Romney was born in 1734 in Dalton-in-Furness, a small town near the scenic Lake District in the northwestern part of England. He was one of 11 children born to Anne Romney and her furniture-maker husband, John. At the age of 10, George was removed from school to apprentice to his father. Although he would later teach himself the history, drama, poetry, and classical literature considered necessary as artistic sources, his technical training as an artist began when he was apprenticed in...

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Guests from Abroad: “Visions of Fancy”

Caroline Cole — Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:36:10 -0500

George Romney rose from provincial obscurity in the north of England to become one of the most fashionable portrait painters in 18th-century London. The story of his remarkable rise to fame is a tale that illuminates the debates, concerns, and hopes of artists during a period of momentous change in the British art world. This Sunday, Rienzi opens its fall exhibition, Visions of Fancy: George Romney, 18th-Century Paintings and Drawings. The show features portraits by the artist,...

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Haydn Times Two

Casey Monahan — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 08:35:27 -0500

This coming Sunday afternoon (September 23), Timothy Hester, fortepianist and associate professor at the University of Houston, will be performing “A Pair of Haydns and a Pair of Mozarts” in Rienzi’s intimate Gallery. Two Haydns? I knew of one—Franz Joseph Haydn, who dominated the 18th century with symphonies and string quartets—from my ill-fated childhood piano lessons. But there were two? The answer is yes, and the two Austrians are brothers. Franz Joseph...

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Out of Storage and onto a Pedestal: “La Fée aux fleurs” Resurrected

Caroline Cole — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 16:11:22 -0500

Once the sculpture’s restoration in its many phases was complete, an additional challenge remained: getting the 800-pound piece back to Rienzi. The project required some calculated planning and a pinch of fairy dust. Rienzi curators hoped to reinstate the sculpture close to its original location, in the bulb garden at the front of the home. Placed there, it would sit between walking paths, amongst caladium and bulbine plants, and in the spring season surrounded by tulips and...

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Out of Storage and onto a Pedestal: Notes from Conservator Jane Gillies

Caroline Cole — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 16:09:40 -0500

The restoration of "La Fée aux fleurs" was a six-month process, expertly managed by Jane Gillies, objects and sculpture conservator at the MFAH, and Ingrid Seyb, assistant conservator. Below is Jane’s summary of the conservation treatment that was involved. The Fairy Formerly Known as Tinker Bell I had never seen the sculpture “Tinker Bell,” but its existence had acquired an almost mythical quality. It was obviously of some significance,...

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