At the end of November 1874, Winston Churchill made his debut two months before his due date while his parents were visiting Blenheim Palace, his grandfather’s estate. He was born into a family of privilege and spent much of his youth at the aristocratic home romping around the vast grounds on his pony, playing with his toy soldiers in the elaborate sitting rooms, and no doubt having his every whim indulged by the many staff members in residence.
But there is one luxury the young Winston did not have the pleasure of experiencing: an 18-karat gold toilet in the water closet next to his childhood bedroom.
Fast forward nearly 145 years and that indignity was corrected… at least temporarily. In early September, Blenheim Palace installed “America,” a sculpture-cum-performance art piece by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan as part of his Victory Is Not an Option exhibition. The work, on loan from the Guggenheim, is a functioning toilet made out of 18-karat gold that was plumbed into the bathroom next to young Winston’s room, shined to a gilded sparkle, and readied for visitors who were encouraged to book a whopping three minutes of quality time with the piece (the Guggenheim offered only half that).
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But the British residency of “America” lasted only days. In the wee hours of the morning just two days after the Cattelan exhibition opened, a group of thieves infiltrated the palace, ripped the functional sculpture out of its plumbing, and absconded by 4:50 a.m. with the heavy loo.
“When this morning I was informed about the robbery I thought it was a prank and it took me a while, after a few checks, to come to the conclusion that it was true and it wasn’t a surreal movie where instead of the jewels of the crown, the thieves went away with a bloody toilet,” Cattelan said in a statement.
In the hours following the bathroom bandits’ disappearance, speculation swirled that the crime may have been a performance art piece enacted by the artist himself. It was not an outlandish theory. Over his decades-long career, Cattelan has been something of a rascal of the art world, known for his irreverent but often startlingly topical works and prankish behavior.
In 1994, he presented a live donkey in a gallery as a self-portrait. In 1996, he stole a fellow artist’s entire show from an Amsterdam gallery and advertised it in a new space as his own exhibition. (The police intervened, but Cattelan was allowed to keep up his “show” for a few additional days.) His sculptures have included a substantial number of taxidermied animals or have taken the form of commentary on public figures, like a wax figure of a man kneeling in prayer who is revealed to be Hitler or a Pope John Paul II felled by a meteor, both currently on view at Blenheim Palace.
In 2011, Cattelan announced his retirement from the art world in grand fashion. In one last show at the Guggenheim titled All, Cattelan suspended every piece of his work included in the exhibition, 128 in total, from the museum’s iconic dome. His inspiration had run out, he was exhausted by the increasing concern with money in the art world, and he decided to end his multi-million dollar art career at its peak.
But five years later, he was back. “Actually, it’s even more of a torture not to work than to work,” he said.
True to form, his return was spectacular. In 2016, he made an exact replica of a Kohler toilet in 18-karat gold for the Guggenheim, where it was installed as the artwork “America” in a fifth-floor bathroom. More than 100,000 visitors waited in long lines for their 90 seconds with the piece, many taking selfies to commemorate the event.
“I’d say it’s a double-edged work: it is 1% art for the 99%,” Cattelan told the Guardian. “It holds out the promise of a quintessential American dream—access to opportunity and development for all—while making visible what is not attainable for most: gold.”
It was prescient enough that Cattelan’s first post-retirement piece debuted shortly before the 2016 U.S. election that would see a man known for preferring a gilded and gaudy decor scheme installed as president. But the relevance of “America” reached even greater heights when it crossed paths with the actual workings of the White House.
In early 2018, the White House approached the Guggenheim with a request to borrow a Van Gogh for the president’s family quarters. The inquiry reached the desk of Nancy Specter, the chief curator and artistic director of the Guggenheim. She responded with a counteroffer: would the president accept a golden toilet instead?
“It is, of course, extremely valuable and somewhat fragile, but we would provide all the instructions for its installation and care,” Specter reportedly wrote in an email to White House curator Donna Hayashi Smith, offering the Cattelan piece as a “long-term loan.”
The art world had a good chuckle over what many labelled a deft trolling; the White House allegedly responded with crickets.
“I would have been honoured for my work to be shown in such a prestigious place as the White House,” Cattelan told the Guardian. When asked if he thought Trump would have used the work of art, the artist responded, “I couldn’t say for sure. It would probably depend on his urgency.”
Trump may not have been interested in an 18-karat toilet, but nearly two years later a group of thieves in the English countryside were not so picky.
In the early hours of the morning of Sept. 14, a crew of men who arrived in two cars broke into Blenheim Palace and ripped the toilet out of Churchill’s bathroom, according to the Thames Valley Police. They weren’t precious about the aged home’s plumbing; in addition to stealing a multimillion-dollar work of art, the thieves also caused damage and flooding to the property due to their brute force heist.
“It is deeply ironic that a work of art portraying the American Dream and the idea of an elite object made available to all should be almost instantly snatched away and hidden from view,” Dominic Hare, CEO of Blenheim Palace, said. “We hope that the wonderful work of our dear friend Maurizio Cattelan becomes immortalised by this stupid and pointless act.”
Two men suspected of involvement in the caper have been arrested and released on bail, but so far the golden toilet remains missing and many are beginning to suspect the worst. Given the current price of gold, the work of art is valued at nearly $5 million in sheer materials. Chances that the pieces has been melted down for its gold increase as the days pass.
But there is still a chance the toilet may be rescued. Cattelan, who was quick to assure The New York Times that “I promise I have an alibi for the night,” is holding out hope that the men who were responsible just wanted to experience the ultimate in luxurious loos.
After wondering if “the thieves of this work are the real artists,” Cattelan expressed his dreams for the piece in a statement he issued following the theft: “I hope ‘America’ will be installed in someone’s bathroom again and used as it was meant to be, as a toilet…Dear thieves, please, if you are reading this, let me know how much you like the piece and how it feels to pee on gold.”
