‘Tis but a scratch
This charming example of Victorian taxidermy – and my charming, I mean disgusting – was in the collection of Louis Mantin, a wealthy eccentric from Moulins. He built an entire mansion around his art collection. Not all of it in execrable taste.
When he died in 1905, he willed the property to the town – on the condition they put it on display and change nothing inside. He wanted people a hundred years hence to see “a specimen of a bourgeois home of the nineteenth century.”
It’s not clear to me that he meant to board it up and completely neglect it for a century, but I haven’t seen the will with my own eyes. Anyway, that’s what they did. Boarded it up and let it gently rot.
After pouring a bunch of money into it again, it opened to the public in 2010. NatGeo has a short slideshow, but you’ll probably see more on an images search.
What it is to have money, with or without taste. Good weekend, all!
Oops! I didn’t hit publish on this last night! Happy Caturday, folks.
Posted: January 30th, 2021 under art, history.
Comments: 5
Comments
Comment from Cantharkmycry
Time: January 30, 2021, 11:19 pm
Oh, thank goodness! I was a bit worried!
Um. Yeah. And one does have to wonder just how typical a specimen of a bourgeois 19th C home his was. . .Just sayin! 😉
Comment from Uncle Al
Time: January 31, 2021, 1:07 am
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a place so utterly saturated with exquisite ugliness and tasteless opulence as the Maison Mantin. The exterior photos of the place made me think immediately of Rick Moranis as Spaceballs’ Dark Helmet.
But I do sort of like those dueling frogs.
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: February 1, 2021, 12:52 pm
(Release the Calvin!)
Would have been more entertaining if it was a mass of red haired kilt wearing Scottish frogs wielding Claymores!
Or maybe a couple of frogs, in an F4 Phantom II !
Comment from Jeff Weimer
Time: February 1, 2021, 7:04 pm
Blake wins the dick. Screech has passed beyond the mortal coil.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: February 1, 2021, 7:48 pm
Oh! I will make a note.
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