| In 1834 the French wallpaper company Zuber et Cie, produced a scenic wallpaper titled Vues d'Amerique du Nord, in which scenes of American life unfold across the forty-nine foot composition. Using the popular tropes of viewing spectacles, Zuber et Cie frames American society as a series of five idealized, picturesque vignettes. When considering this wallpaper, there are two levels of spectacle that occur simultaneously: those occurring on the wallpaper's surface and the larger spectacle, which the viewer would have experienced when surrounded by the panoramic-like wallpaper. In this thesis, I examine the layered spectacles, placing the wallpaper within a large context of French interest in America, popular vocabularies of spectacle, and the nineteenth-century French home. Through my analysis, I articulate how and why Vues d'Amerique du Nord was a product of a very specific time in the July Monarchy, during which America was envisioned as the future of France. |
