The Peacock Room (1877)*

Artist/Designer: James Abbott , McNeill Whistler

Project Location: Washington, D.C., United States

Figure 1: The Peacock Room. Source: John Bedell, The Peacock Room. 2012, Digital Image. ( Source | Accessed : April 4, 2014 )

Figure 2: The Peacock Room. Source: John Bedell, The Peacock Room. 2012, Digital Image. ( Source | Accessed : April 4, 2014 )

Figure 3: The Peacock Room. Source: John Bedell, The Peacock Room. 2012, Digital Image. ( Source | Accessed : April 4, 2014 )

Figure 4: The Peacock Room. Source: Melka Myers, Whistler's Peacock Room Shines On. 2012, Digital Image. ( Source | Accessed : April 4, 2014 )

Figure 5: The Peacock Room. Source: Ikono, James McNeill Whistler's Peacock Room Goes Digital. 2013, Digital Image. ( Source | Accessed : April 4, 2014 )

Style/Period(s):
Aesthetic Movements

Primary Material(s):
Paint

Function(s):
Residential Structure

Related Website(s):

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/videos/category/arts-culture/a-look-inside-the-peacock-room/

http://www.asia.si.edu/exhibitions/online/peacock/

http://peacockroom.wayne.edu/

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/the-story-behind-the-peacock-rooms-princess-159271229/?no-ist

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/artworld/2011/04/18/110418craw_artworld_schjeldahl

Significant Date(s):
19th Century

Additional Information:
Title(s): Harmony in Blue and Gold: The Peacock Room Designer/Architect: James Abbott McNeill Whistler. Interior painted in 1876–77.

Merrill, Linda. The Peacock Room: A Cultural Biography. Washington, DC: Freer Gallery of Art, 1998.

Pyne, Kathleen. Art and the Higher Life: Painting and Evolutionary Thought in Late Nineteenth Century America. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1996.

Schulz, Max F. Paradise Preserved: Recreations of Eden in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth Century England. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985.

Yallop, Jacqueline. Magpies, Squirrels & Thieves: How the Victorians Collected the World. London: Atlantic Books, 2011.

Additional Information

Building Address
Freer Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.

Supporting Designers/Staff

Architecture by Richard Norman Shaw (7 May 1831 – 17 November 1912)
Wall paintings by James McNeill Whistler (July 11, 1834 – July 17, 1903)
Shelves by Thomas Jeckyll

Significant Dates
First constructed in 1876-1877
Purchased by Charles Lang Freer in 1904
Installed at The Smithsonian in 1919
Gallery opened to public in 1923
Restored in 2015

Associated Projects
Home of Frederick Richards Leyland

Tags
Aesthetic Movement, British, American, Painted Walls, Porcelain, Gold leaf

Viewers should treat all images as copyrighted and refer to each image's links for copyright information.