LUXURY LUXURY in the LOW LUXURY COUNTRIES the in in the e superflu, chose très nécessaire”, wrote Voltaire 1736 in COUNTRIES LOW LOW his poem Le mondain. Needless to say that luxury is much Lmore than merely materialised/solidified redundancy. Offering a first panoramic view on various manifestations of conspicuous material culture in a Netherlandish context from 1500 until the present, this study – rather than investigating self- COUNTRIES evident cases of luxury – aims to explore its boundaries and the different stages in which luxury is fabricated or sometimes only simulated. Thematically, the volume focuses on two major issues, i.e. collections and foodways as means of expression of prosperity and splendour, which will be discussed by an international group of scholars, emanating from disciplines such as archaeology, history, book and media studies, art history, linguistics, and historical (ed.) Rittersma Rengenier ethnology. With an afterword by Maxine Berg. MIScellaneous RefleCtions on NETHERlandish MaTERial CULTURE, 1500 to the PRESENT Rengenier Rittersma (ed.) www.vubpress.be 9 789054 875406 Miscellaneous Reflections on Netherlandish Material Culture, 1500 to the Present Rengenier C. Rittersma (ed.) © 2010 FARO. Flemish interface for cultural heritage Cover image: Adriaan de Lelie, De kunstgalerij van Jan Priemstraat 51, B-1000 Brussels Gildemeester Jansz in zijn huis aan de Herengracht te www.faronet.be Amsterdam, 1794-1795 www.pharopublishing.be © Rijksmuseum Amsterdam Editorial board: Marc Jacobs, Rengenier C. Rittersma, All rights reserved. No part of this book may be Peter Scholliers, Ans Van de Cotte reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, Final editors: Frederik Hautain & Ans Van de Cotte recording, or on any information, storage or retrieval system without permission of the publisher. Authors: Maxine Berg, Daniëlle De Vooght, Hester Dibbits, Florike Egmond, Cornelia Fanslau, ISBN: 978 90 5487 797 4 Anne Goldgar, Christof Jeggle, Joji Nozawa, Wettelijk depot: D/2010/11.161/121 Rengenier Rittersma, Nelleke Teughels, NUR: 680 Bert Timmermans, Steven Van den Berghe Design: stip/ontwerpt - www.stipontwerpt.be Print: Drukkerij Newgoff, Mariakerke Academic and Scientific ASP Publishers Part one Context and Concepts Putting Social Status and Social Aspirations on Display: A Panoramic Study on 9 Manifestations of Luxury in the Low Countries, 1500 to the Present RENGENIER C. RITTERSMA Economies of Quality as a Concept of Research on Luxury 25 Christof JEGGLE Part two Eccentrica, Exotica, and Nostalgia Precious Nature: Rare Naturalia as Collectors’ Items and Gifts in Early Modern Europe 47 FlorikE EGMOND The Use and Misuse of Flowers: Tulipmania and the Concept of Luxury 67 ANNE Goldgar Wine as a Luxury at the Dutch Factory in Japan during the Second Half of the 18th Century 85 Joji NOzawa Part Three Taste, Knowledge, and Provenance Networkers and Mediators in the 17th-century Antwerp Art World: The Impact of 109 Collectors-Connoisseurs on Artistic Processes of Transmission and Selection BERT TIMMERMANS Pronken as Practice. Material Culture in The Netherlands, 1650-1800 135 HESTER DIBBITS Wohl dem der’s sehen kann! Private Amsterdam Art Collections, 1770-1860 159 CORNELIA FANSLAU Part Four Hybrids, Grey Zones, and Phantasms A Daily Display of Luxury? The Dining Table of king Leopold II of Belgium, 1865-1909 193 DANIëLLE DE VOOGHT Marketing Food, Marketing a Necessity? Belgian Food Retailing and the Concept of 213 Luxury in Advertising, 1870-1940 NELLEkE TEUGHELS The Language of Luxury. Opulence in Gastronomic Discourse, 1960-2000 239 STEVEN VAN DEN BERGHE Afterword 259 Concluding Remarks. The Contemporary World and Histories of Writing about Luxury MAxINE BERG Part one Context and Concepts 1.1 Putting Social Status and Social Aspirations on Display: A Panoramic Study on Manifestations of Luxury in the Low Countries, 1500 to the Present* RENGENIER C. RITTERSMA * The writing of this introduction and the preparation of these contributions for publication has been made possible by fellowships from NWO (Rubicon- programme) and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. – 11 O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars are in the poorest thing superfluous. Shakespeare, King Lear R ENGENIER Needing would not be tragic if we could learn to give up what we cannot get. C. R But we are not animals: our needs and our realities are not made for each other. ITTERSMA Michael Ignatieff, The needs of strangers – History conferences and their proceedings can usually be subdivided in those with a telescopic and those with a panoramic span. This volume belongs to the second category in that it – instead of offering a high-precision view of a more or less distant historical phenomenon – attempts to give a first rough synopsis of various dimensions and manifestations of luxury in Netherlandish material culture from 1500 to the present. The articles collected in this volume are elaborated papers which were originally presented at a conference, organised in Brussels on 21-22 November 2008 and coordinated by Peter Scholliers, FARO. Flemish interface for cultural heritage, and the undersigned. The symposium was made possible by the financial support of the Flemish and Dutch Research Organisations in the framework of the programme Vlaams-Nederlands Comité (Flemish-Dutch Cooperation in the Humanities), and by generous contributions from FOST (Social and Cultural Food Studies, Vrije Universiteit Brussel) and FARO. The present volume contains a selection of ten articles out of the fourteen that were delivered at the conference. Before introducing the various contributions to this collective work, three preliminary issues should be clarified: firstly, the vexed question of luxury and its use in this volume. Secondly, some explicatory remarks need to be made on the chronological and geographical perimeters of this study and more in particular on the adoption of the somewhat ambiguous term ‘Netherlandish’ in this context. Finally, a few lines should be dedicated on what is actually meant here with ‘panoramic study’. 12 1 / Luxury – limits and chances of a concept It is generally known that the notion of luxury in European culture, due to – amongst others – the stoic and Christian tradition, is a morally much contested one.1 By virtue of these perennial debates, luxury inevitably also evolved into an important analytical key for social scientists and humanities scholars, attempting COUNTRIES to ‘decipher’ mechanisms and devices aimed at inducing social stratification within groups or societies from the past or the present. Almost one hundred years after the IN THE LOW publication of one of the first systematic approaches to explore the history of luxury – Luxus und Kapitalismus,2 written by the German sociologist annex economist LUXURY Werner Sombart (1913) – it can be said that luxury has grown into a widely explored topic and, more specifically, into a vividly contested concept as well. This very controversial nature of luxury may be, at least partly, due to the ideological rift which characterised nearly all intellectual debates of the past century. In a more indirect way luxury also turned out to be a proven touchstone to contribute to the verification or falsification of other Gordian knots, such as the problem of agency with regard to consumer behaviour,3 the question whether consumption is demand-driven or supply-driven,4 the contraposition of protestant versus Roman catholic consumption patterns,5 the issue of the informational value of material culture,6 the problem of the social, political, and ecological implications of commodity chains7 etc. 1 See e.g.: C.J. Be r r y , The idea of luxury. A conceptual and historical investigation. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994; J. Ap p l e B y , ‘Consumption in early modern social thought’, in: J. Br e w e r & R. po r t e r (eds.), Consumption and the world of goods. London & New York, Routledge, 1993, p. 162-177; W. Sm i t h , Consumption and the making of respectability 1600 – 1800. New York, Routledge 2002, especially p. 63-139; U. wy r w A , ‘Luxus und konsum. Begriffsgeschichtliche Aspekte’, in: R. re i t h & t. me y e r (eds.), “Luxus und Konsum” - eine historische Annäherung. Münster, Waxmann, 2003, p. 47-60; t. me y e r , ‘zwischen sozialer Restriktion und ökonomischer Notwendigkeit. „konsum“ in ökonomischen Texten der Frühen Neuzeit‘, in: re i t h & me y e r , “Luxus und Konsum“, p. 61-82; e. hu n d e r t , ‘Mandeville, Rousseau and the political economy of fantasy‘, in: M. Be r g & e. eg e r (eds.), Luxury in the eighteenth century: debates, desires and delectable goods. Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2003, p. 28-41; n. Bu l S t , ‘Vom Luxusverbot zur Luxussteuer. Wirtschafts- und sozialgeschichtliche Aspekte von Luxus und konsum in der Vormoderne‘, in: M. pr i n z (ed.), Der lange Weg in den Überfluss. Anfänge und Entwicklung der Konsumgesellschaft seit der Vormoderne. Paderborn, Schöningh 2003, p. 47-60; A. pr o v o S t , ‘Les usages du luxe. Enjeux d’un débat au xVIIIe siècle’, in: O. Ass o u l y (ed.), Le luxe. Essais sur la fabrique de l’ostentation. Paris, Editions de l’institut française de la mode, 2005, p. 69-85. 2 This was the lapidary title of the first edition (München & Leipzig, Duncker & Humblot, 1913). The title of the second, more diffused edition, reads as follows Liebe, Luxus und Kapitalismus. Über die Entstehung der modernen Welt aus dem Geist der Verschwendung (1922). 3 M. Bi A n C h i (ed.), The active consumer. Novelty and surprise in consumer choice. London & New York, Routledge, 1998. 4 J. de vr i e S , The industrious revolution. Consumer behavior and the household economy, 1650 to the present. Cambridge & New York, Cambridge University Press, 2008, see, for example, p. 20-25. 5 M. we B e r , ‘Die protestantische Ethik und der „Geist“ des kapitalismus’, in: M.