The Gilded Dish: A Rienzi Blog
Rienzi is the house museum and collection of European paintings and decorative arts at the MFAH. Our articles highlight elements of the collection, discuss additions and changes to the house or gardens, and review events held at Rienzi for those of you not able to be here in person. Feel free to e-mail rienziblog@mfah.org with questions, comments, and suggestions. Welcome!
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30 SepFri / 2011
The abundance at our dining table might never have come together, if not for guidance from the omniscient hands of Mrs. Elizabeth Raffald. The Experienced English Housekeeper, written in 1769 by Mrs. Raffald, was used as a model for the dining table in Rienzi’s exhibition. I am delighted that we are able to honor Mrs. Raffald, by laying out one more dinner course to her keen specifications. What the housekeeper-turned-author would have thought, if she...
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30 SepFri / 2011
This year Rienzi continues its collaboration with the Houston Grand Opera Studio. Each year, four musical programs are performed in Rienzi’s intimate Gallery by up-and-coming opera performers. This Friday and Saturday, September 30th and October 1st, begins the 2011-2012 recital schedule. Among the selections for this weekend, HGO Studio will be performing A Whitman Service, by Lee Hoiby who has brought several of Walt Whitman poems into the world of music and...
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28 SepWed / 2011
Every morning at Rienzi, I make a trek (or several…) from the kitchen to the Education office with a rather large cup of coffee (half and half, no sugar). On my way, I tend to cut through the Living Room bar, passing a display of beautiful pink and orange gilded porcelain – but as beautiful as it is, I don’t often stop to look at it. That is, until I read through the October selection...
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27 SepTue / 2011
In preparing for English Taste, we spent considerable time at the dining tables of eighteenth-century England, but on the way stopped into the annals of twenty-first century technology.
For its very first exhibition, Rienzi is offering an audio tour by use of individual MP3 players. Visitors are invited to listen to a series of voice recordings featuring discussion on historic dining, including eighteenth-century etiquette, decorative motifs, and authentic period recipes. This is a big development...
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26 SepMon / 2011
This is our second week hosting English Taste – the grandest eighteenth-century dinner party in Houston – and now that the rush of opening has subsided, we are ready to celebrate in the appropriate fashion. If you join us at this Thursday’s punch party, you will share in a delightful cup of history, and to that end, here is a bit more on the tale of English punch:
The popularity of alcoholic punch in...
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