Curated Curiosities - A Weekly Art Newsletter

Stay informed about the exciting and everchanging world of art and auctions - whether you’re a seasoned collector or just getting your feet wet. We curate & deliver the most essential & exciting art and auction news, once a week (in a way that won’t make you fall asleep.)

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Curated Curiosities from previous issues - if you like what you see, sign up to get the weekly roundup.

Death and Taxidermy 🐀

The Victorians were a strange lot. From wearing smothering corsets to believing every problem could be solved with the liberal application of arsenic, their tastes ran a little (or a lot) different from today. They had a macabre fascination with death, superstition, and gore, and this even went as far as children's toys.

Wealthy Victorian-era parents wanted only the best for their children. Marbles & jump ropes? Nope, think again. Posh children would be given the best of the best in stuffed animals, the pick of the litter. Not just any stuffed animals, but the finest, most authentic. Literally.

We’re talking toy horses, giraffes, dogs, cats, sheep, bears, and rabbits stitched together with pelts from the real deal. This phenomenon brings a whole new dimension to the idea of a petting zoo! Thankfully this grisly trend proved temporary, making the surviving examples valuable for their rarity.

What The
Heck Is It?!

The Goffering Iron

What was the first thing that came to your mind when you saw this week's "What the Heck is it?" Medieval torture device? Abstract ornamental piece? Oddly-specifically-sized hole poker? You're wrong on all counts! This week's ‘What The Heck Is It?’ is a goffering iron. What was it used for, you ask? Well, to curl your ruff! (Duh.) Ruffs were the stiff ornamental neckpieces that symbolized status, wealth, and power. They worked by heating the removable part directly over a stove or fire and then re-inserting it into the outer protective layer. The heat radiated through the metal and gave the cloth the curled shape everyone raved about. The curlier your ruff, the more likely you were to turn heads. That is, of course, if their ruffs allowed them. (Hehe)

Have we ever heard of transferware? Maybe it’s your first time… But this decoration method molded the pottery and ceramic industry into the one we recognize today. Emerging in the 1700s as a result of the Industrial Revolution, it transformed Staffordshire, England, into the pottery-making capital of the world. So how exactly does it work?

•  A design is created and engraved onto a copper plate.

•  The pattern gets transferred onto a piece of paper.

•  This paper is measured to match the size of the ceramic piece.

•  The paper is then pressed directly onto its surface and imprints the design.

Why exactly did this cause such radical change? Because it made commercial pottery production possible and profitable. It made owning earthenware possible for the emerging middle class, allowed for new trends and tastes that reflected a changing society, and moving away from traditional patterns to instead encompass buildings, landscapes, and notable figures of the day. Most importantly, it allowed us to accuse our fellows of acting like bulls in a china shop, and you can't put a price on that.

What The
Heck Is It?!

Tiny Salesman Sample

Lot No. 312 and this week's "What the Heck is it'' had us scratching our heads longer than we'll ever admit. What is it exactly? Well, it's a salesman sample, of course. (Of course.) Smith & Winchester furnace salesmen used these perfectly scaled models to illustrate how the real thing would have worked for potential customers. 

Our investigations show it was likely fully operational, finding some carbon residue where they would have lit the fire. We're not imagining tiny little salesmen, you're imagining tiny little salesmen.