Lightner Museum

 St. Augustine, Florida 

Thursday, March 17, 2022

    The Lightner Museum is a museum of antiques, mostly American Gilded Age pieces, housed within the Hotel Alcazar building. The museum occupies three floors of the former Hotel Alcazar. The first floor houses a Victorian Science and Industry Room that displays shells, rocks, minerals, and Native American artifacts. Furthermore, the first floor contains a music room filled with instruments dating from the 1870s through the 1920s. The second floor contains cut glass, Victorian art glass, and stained-glass work from Louis Comfort Tiffany's studio. On the top floor is the ballroom's upper balcony which exhibits paintings, sculptures, and furniture. Looking down from the balcony is where the swimming pool used to be which now hosts Cafe Alcazar. At the Lightner Museum, they are "inclusive, inspiring, engaging and stewards" (Lightner Museum). 

https://lightnermuseum.org/

Exterior Photo 1

Exterior Photo 2

Artifact Photo 1

    The above photo displays Egyptian, Syrian, and Roman examples of oil lamps. The lamps are used to produce light continuously for a period of time using an oil-based fuel source. The use of oil lamps began thousands of years ago and continues to this day, although the use is less common. They work the same way as a candle would. There are multiple components to the oil lamp consisting of the shoulder, the pouring hole, the wick hole and nozzle, the handle, the discus, and the fuel chamber. Oil lamps can be categorized based on different criteria including material, shape, structure, design, and imagery. For example, there are seven different categories to be split amongst such as wheel-made, volute (early imperial), high imperial, frog, African red slip, slipper, and factory lamps. 

Artifact Photo 2

    The origin of the use of cigar bands is a myth. One legend reports that Catherine the Great, the Empress of Russia in the late 18th century did not want to stain her fingers so she took cigars wrapped in silk. Other tales have been told of paper bands used on cigars exported to Europe to prevent the staining of gentleman's white gloves. Cigars were just becoming popular in Europe in the 1800s. A German is credited by the Cubans for inventing the modern-day cigar band. Gustave Bock was an immigrant to Cuba who owned a cigar factory and seeking to protect his brand, he placed a paper ring with his signature on each of his cigars for export. By 1855, nearly every Cuban export carried a cigar band and the bands were registered with the government. Cigar bans became an eye-catching addition to cigars in general. As bands became more prevalent, they became more colorful, and collecting cigar bands became popular. As shown above, is a collection of cigar band labels over the years which were used to create a piece of artwork. 

Image in Conversation #1

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Titanic

    The artifact of the I.C. Woodward Model Steamboat reminded me of the Titanic. The Titanic was designed by the Irish shipbuilder William Pirrie and built-in Belfast was sought to be the world's fastest ship. The ship spanned 883 feet from stern to bow and its hull was divided into 16 compartments because four of the compartments could be flooded without causing a critical loss of buoyancy, the Titanic was considered unsinkable. The vessel set out at full speed for New York City on April 14th, 1912. Just before midnight, the ship failed to divert its course from an iceberg and ruptured at least five of its compartments. Those compartments filled with water and pulled down the bow of the ship causing it to sink and the stern raised up to an almost vertical position above the water. The Titanic then broke in half, and, at about 2:20 am, on April 15th, the stern and bow sank to the ocean floor. Due to a shortage of lifeboats and a lack of emergency procedures, more than 1,500 people went down on the ship or froze to death in the icy North Atlantic waters. Most of the 700 or so survivors were women and children. 

    The wreck of the Titanic was discovered in 1985 by a Franco-American expedition sponsored by the United States Navy. Thousands of artifacts have been recovered and displayed at multiple museums around the world. The Titanic has become one of the most famous ships in history. 

Image in Conversation #2

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/ln4na

    One of the first things that caught my eye in the museum was the golden candelabrum which immediately led my mind to think of beauty and the beast. Lumière is a candelabrum with a bronze human-like face, arms tipped with candles, and legs to walk with as well. In the museum, the candelabrum had a figure of a woman and on her head was the candle-holding portion. Comparing the two objects, they are quite similar in the way they are configured and color-wise as well. 

    A candelabrum is a term that originated from Latin and translates to candle-tree. That is due to the many branches or arms of the candelabrum, resembling that of a tree spreading its branches in all directions. The candle has been around as early as 3000 BC and since then, displaying light is a necessity. Candleholders or candelabrums made of clay have been found dating back to 400 BC. In the 1800s, antique silver candelabrums became a regular at the evening dinner table, providing illumination and decoration. Today, candelabrums are used for decoration and sometimes for illumination like in the olden times. 

Literature in Conversation 

    In the excerpt from Habitat Threshold, by Craig Santos Perez, he touches on a lot of issues concerning global warming and our planet. His poem "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Glacier", displays ways to look at one specific subject, such as a glacier, and digs deeper into the meaning of it. In the thirteenth reason (the first in the poem), he says "Among starving polar bears, / the only moving thing / was the edge of a glacier", placing emphasis on what is happening in the world day by day (Perez). With each day, animals continue to starve and nothing is done except the glaciers keep moving due to global warming. As humans and animals, we are destroying our planet, yet doing nothing to fix it. 

    The whole issue with the environment is shown tremendously through St. Augustine. In our town, every time it rains, the town is underwater. Due to living in a historical area, each street is different and has a different layout creating creases for water to reside. When Henry Flagler came to town, he had huge ideas of building state-of-the-art hotels. For him to do so, he had to create more dry land which lead to the Maria Sanchez Creek being gone. During the removal of the creek, it was filled with sand from the Bradford property. Today, we know the hotels as Flagler College and the Lightner Museum. The hotels are basically built on a "swamp". Eventually, the town placed a dam to control the floods which created Lake Maria Sanchez. Henry Flagler had destroyed a living marsh to place something more 'useful' for individuals. His buildings did not help the Earth, instead, he added partially to the cause of global warming and the wrongdoing of the environment. 

Creative Component 

medium: computer paper and colored pencils

    I chose to draw a piece of stained glass with poppy flowers in it. This type of flower means a lot to me because it, first of all, represents my birth month but also stands for my grandfather. I used to call him poppy and he, unfortunately, passed away in 2012. I figured it would be best to create an image inside that means something to me rather than something random.