Darren Waterston: Filthy Lucre

Darren Waterston: Filthy Lucre by Cross, Susan. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780847844135.

Inspired by James McNeill Whistler’s famous Peacock Room, contemporary painter Darren Waterston creates his own decadent interpretation in a major installation at MASS MoCA. Darren Waterston’s Filthy Lucre is a contemporary reimagining of James McNeill Whistler’s decorative masterpiece Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room—originally a dining room in the London mansion of shipping magnate Frederick Leyland. In 1876 and 1877, Whistler transformed the space with painted leather walls, gilded shutters, and a ceiling reflecting the coppery golds and brilliant blues of a peacock’s plumage. Waterston reconstructs the historical room as a sumptuous ruin, replete with reinterpretations of Whistler’s paintings and 250 hand-painted vessels. This title features all-new photography of Whistler’s and Waterston’s rooms, accompanied by essays by their curators and a scholar of patronage.