Maurizio Cattelan and His Golden America

In 2018, the White House requested to borrow Vincent van Gogh’s painting Landscape With Snow from the Guggenheim Museum for the Trumps’ living quarters. What happened next shocked both local and international audiences. Discover the story of Maurizio Cattelan’s America and its humorous twist.

The Guggenheim declined the White House’s request and instead proposed a striking alternative: an 18-karat, fully functional, solid gold toilet titled America, created by Maurizio Cattelan.

The White House did not respond to this offer. However, Cattelan’s America, a satirical piece highlighting the excess of wealth in the U.S., gained renewed attention due to the Guggenheim’s response.

Maurizio Cattelan, an Italian artist known for his satirical sculptures, gained fame with works like La Nona Ora (The Ninth Hour), which depicts Pope John Paul II struck down by a meteorite and caused a scandal in religious circles. Cattelan is regarded as the art scene’s joker, with all his works featuring a humorous twist. Jonathan P. Binstock, curator of contemporary art at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, described him as “one of the great post-Duchampian artists and a smartass, too.”

Cattelan has not disclosed the cost of the gold used in “America,” though estimates suggest it exceeded $1 million. He has avoided interpreting his work, preferring to leave that to his audience. Although the gold toilet was conceived before Trump’s candidacy, Cattelan acknowledged that Trump’s pervasive presence in American culture might have influenced its creation.

“It was probably in the air,” Cattelan told a Guggenheim blogger in 2016 when America was displayed. For a year, the Guggenheim exhibited America in a public restroom on the museum’s fifth floor, where visitors could use it. It was a hit.

Cattelan described the golden toilet as “1 percent art for the 99 percent,” suggesting it reflects the wealth that permeates society. “Whatever you eat, a $200 lunch or a $2 hot dog, the results are the same, toilet-wise,” he said.