Objection D'Art

Welcome to the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

I'm Bailiff Jesse Thorne.

This week, Objection Dart.

Susan brings the case against her husband, David.

David is an art history professor.

For the last year, he's been researching an early 20th-century American Impressionist named Agnes Millen Richmond.

He started buying her paintings, and they're expensive.

Susan says they have too many already.

She says her husband is obsessed.

Who's right, who's wrong?

Only one can decide.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman enters the courtroom and presents an obscure cultural reference.

Can I pose a somewhat abstract, purely hypothetical question?

Sure.

If you knew you were going to die, possibly soon, what would you do?

Am I the richest man on earth?

No, you're you.

Do I have a superpower?

No, No,

you're you.

I know I'm me, but do I have a superpower?

Okay, you're you're invisible and you know you're going to die.

What would you do?

Okay, that's easy.

I'd go to space camp.

Space camp?

Yeah, it's in Alabama.

It's where kids go learn to become astronauts.

Always wanted to go since I was nine.

You're invisible.

And you would go to space camp?

I didn't pick invisible.

You picked invisible.

Aren't you too old to go to space camp?

You're never too old to go to space camp, dude.

You're never too old to go to space camp, dude.

Bailiff Jesse Thorne, please swear the litigant's in.

Susan and David, please rise and raise your right hands.

Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

So help you, God or whatever.

I do.

I do.

Do you swear to abide by Judge John Hodgman's ruling, despite the fact that the primary decorative element in his home office is an Indian movie poster that Ken Plume put there without even asking permission.

I do.

I do.

Judge Hodgman, you may proceed.

It's Turkish, Jesse.

Okay, my apologies.

It's the Turkish science fiction film called Body, B-A-D-I, and I love it just like I love Ken Plume, just like I love Bailiff Jesse and Jennifer Marmor and the whole J squad.

And so far, I like our litigants.

We'll see if I love them.

David and Susan, you may be seated for an immediate summary judgment in one of your favors.

Can either of you name the piece of culture that I obscurely referenced, dare I say, performed dramatically with an unknown party as I entered this fake courtroom?

Oh, I don't know.

What do we say about

Susan?

You go first.

Well, I know there have been a lot of movies that Space Camp stars in.

And there was.

Can you name one?

I dare you.

I think it was called space.

Space camp, yeah, space camp, yeah.

Um, and there were I don't know about space balls, but definitely space camp.

I don't know.

Um, and and to tell you the truth, I haven't watched any of them, but I do remember that there was one in which

people accidentally end up in outer space and there were adults involved.

So maybe it's from the movie where

I don't know.

I think I haven't seen it, but I do think that that is the plot of Space Camp.

Okay.

I think I would have liked Who Wants to Be a Millionaire better if when they were talking through what the answer to the question is, they then just sort of lost track of what the words were in the sentence and then just said, I don't, I don't, I don't know.

Yeah, I'm, I'm afraid I, I can't name the movie, but I'll say Space Camp.

Space Camp, I'm putting down for you, Space Camp,

Space Balls,

LaMel Brooks film.

John, for me, put down Space Buddies.

That's where Airbuds' children go to space.

I think.

Okay, I'll put down Space Buddies.

I'll put down Space Camp.

I'll put down Space Balls by Mel Brooks.

And then I'll put down also the movie in which the kids go to Space Camp but end up going to space, which I think is Space Camp.

Do you have any other guesses that you want to add, David?

No, I'm fine.

Well, no, but you have to.

Oh, Space Jam, obviously.

Space Jam.

Space Jam and Space Jam 2, the new batch or whatever.

I don't don't know.

They're all good.

They're all good space guesses, but all guesses are wrong.

That is a bit of dialogue from a movie called Stranger Than Fiction.

A Will Farrell

Morden comic.

Oh, you've seen it twice?

Why didn't you guess it?

When was the last time you saw it?

2006 when it came out?

Roughly, yeah.

Back-to-back showings on the same day?

Like, I got to see this again.

Actually, no, I watched it when it had come to video already.

So probably closer to 2010 or so.

Well, that bit of amusing dialogue was written by Zach Helm.

It was performed between Will Farrell and Tony Hale in

the movie, but in this dramatic reenactment, it was performed by me in the Will Farrell role and our friend Jason Sims

in the Tony Hale role.

Now, Jason Sims, you may or may not know, David and Susan,

is a resident of the same town where we find you.

Oh.

Huntsville, Alabama, which isn't indeed where the space camp is.

Exactly.

And Jason Sims has been our correspondent from Huntsville, going all the way back to episode six of this podcast.

To tree or not to tree.

Jason Sims is the one who for many years gave us a report on his sad vent tree, the sadness tree that he would put up in his shed.

He still lives in Huntsville, although he's traveled the world many times since.

And

you can find him at his wonderful Instagram page, which is at Instasims, I-N-S-T-A, S-I-M-S.

And he frequently appears at the Shenanigans Comedy Theater in Huntsville, Alabama, and indeed recently performed improv comedy at the Saturn.

in Birmingham, which is the inherited legacy of the late great Bottle Tree Cafe in Birmingham.

I have not been to Alabama in many years, David and Susan.

So, and I don't think I met you the last time I was there, but I like the area a lot, and it's really nice to visit with you today.

But all guesses are wrong, so we got to hear this case.

So let's take it to Huntsville, as they say.

Who brings this case before me seeking justice?

I do.

Susan.

All right, Susan, before we get into your complaint, just to give some background to our audience, let's turn to David for a moment.

David, you're a retired art historian.

Correct.

No one ever retires, though.

True.

Absolutely true.

In fact, many retired people become art historians.

Are you talking about that nun from public television?

I'm talking about that nun from PBS.

David,

you are an art historian by vocation and avocation, and

you are working on, it says here, quote, working on an artist named Agnes.

Millen Richmond.

What does that mean by working on?

And why are you working on Agnes?

What is she all

Yeah, well, I was teaching a class, Modern Women Artists, at the University in Huntsville.

And I'd known about her art for a little while, and I liked it, but I decided that I needed to take over my students' work because they weren't doing it the way I wanted it done.

Here we go.

So I was doing a little bit of research and I found that a patient.

You Thanosed it.

You Thanosed it.

I did.

you're like I'll do it myself I do it myself I haven't seen the movie or read the comics but does that mean that he snapped and have his students disappeared well it was it was a terrible move and look to your left look to your right by the end of this semester I will have disappeared one of those two people the term you're looking for is blipped okay blipped thank you but then he retired and and just like that they all disappeared and finally he could do art history the right way It's so true.

So I found, I looked online, found a painting of hers from 1920 for sale in Munich for 300 euros.

Right.

Which is not like Antiques Roadshow.

You mean it was affordable?

It was, yeah, absolutely.

So I bought it.

But before we get into your acquisition of the work,

what was interesting to you about Agnes Mellon Richmond and who is she, or was she, I should say, as an artist?

Well, she's pretty much,

I think I can use this word, a badass woman.

Go on.

And the painting that I bought is called 15, and it was a painting that she designed when she was teaching 15-year-old students.

And it has...

Three little things in the background.

One is a picture of a student about 15 years old.

And then to the right of the central figure is is a married woman doing chores for her husband.

And then a baby stroller to the right, looking like a cartoon hopeless figure.

So the message was, don't get married, be a badass woman painter.

But there's a woman in the foreground of this painting as well.

And for those of you who are curious,

if you're watching this on YouTube, on our YouTube channel at Judge John Hodgman Pod, you can see this painting right now.

It is exhibit A in this court

If you are not watching, go to our show page or to any of our social media where you will find a photograph of the image that now belongs to David.

It's in the David collection of Agnes Mill and Richmond paintings.

It is called 15.

You can see that it is a painting of

a rather proud and intelligent and independent-looking woman seated in front of a mural.

of much more, shall we say, generic or stereotypical gender portrayal of young women at the time.

And the time we're talking about is what, the 1920s, 20 about.

Okay, 1920.

And she's an American artist?

Yes.

And where is she from?

Or she's not still alive, I presume.

No, no, no.

She was born in Alton, Illinois, near St.

Louis, and then moved to New York to become an illustrator, and then fell in with a lot of high-powered New York artists and

became an art teacher and moved in lofty circles until they got tired of a strong woman.

And then what did they do?

Wicker man situation?

Pretty much.

Yeah.

They snapped and

they blipped her?

They blipped her.

They got her, knocked her out of the top shelf, and she had to set up a co-op gallery right next to Central Park that she operated for over a decade and made it work.

Now, one of her great preoccupations and subjects, and a place where she lived at least part of the time, was Gloucester, Massachusetts, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

We're going to talk about her painting 10-pound island Gloucester a little later in the podcast.

So you're saying that the fine artists that she circulated with in Gloucester got tired of her and blipped her, and then she had to set up a co-op in the Central Park or outside Central Park in Manhattan.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And what led to her blipping?

Why did she get exiled from this artistic movement?

Well, John Sloan was one of of her close friends who blipped her and a

super famous artist.

And he didn't think that art should ever be political.

And she was a suffragist.

She wanted to paint strong women and he wanted to have beautiful women and beautiful landscapes.

And he didn't want a troublemaker.

And she was.

So you're out there collecting.

Agnes Millen Richmond paintings

more than your wife Susan would like you to be, but you're collecting them in part to do work on her, historical work on her, and to

rescue her reputation to some degree.

Yeah.

And what I want to do is to donate all of the paintings that I buy to museums so that she'll be an artist on the map.

So it's all about putting art above money.

Now, Susan, you're married to David.

I am.

You're not an art historian.

I am not.

What do you do all day?

Well, I'm sort of retired now and

do a lot of gardening, some traveling, and

a fair bit of activism right now.

And before that, I was a nurse for a few years during COVID.

And before that, I was a professional musician for about 30, 35 years.

Whoa.

The best time to be a nurse.

Yeah, it was at the height of COVID.

Yeah.

You're like, hmm,

I've been a professional musician for many years, but here comes

this horrible emergency.

I guess I'll become a nurse.

Good for you, Susan.

Well, it actually happened afterwards.

And the timing was not bad.

Because about a year after I started working as a nurse, the symphony had to shut down during COVID for a while.

So there wasn't much work for musicians anyway.

Got it.

Well, there's plenty of work for nurses.

So thank you for that work.

Now, I understand from the art history work that your husband David has been doing that Agnes Millen Richmond is dead.

And I know this is true because if she were alive, he would be married to her because he's obviously in love with her.

I think so.

Is that why you hate her so much?

You know what?

That one hadn't even occurred to me.

So I'm going to say no.

That has no bearing on my objections to what's going on here.

So what are your objections then?

This sounds like a very, a very interesting and wholesome hobby.

Well, it is, but it's reached a level of obsession, I'd say, with accumulating things, which is not out of character for David,

but it's the first time it's been applied to the research, art history research that's been part of his career.

And so,

you know,

he's explained to me why he needs to have

hundreds and hundreds of books arriving at the house and why he needs to travel

sometimes for, I think, not really great productive reasons, long distances to do his research.

But

really, the part where he starts buying the art is where that's a little bit out of character.

Because when we first married 42 years ago, he told me that art historians should not invest in the artist they are studying.

That's an ethical problem there because then they are doing and saying things to make the work more valuable and it benefits them financially instead of just being pure historical stuff.

So I would like to interrogate David about his rank hypocrisy in a moment.

If I may ask, is your primary complaint that David is acting unethically as an art historian or he's junking up your Huntsville home with how many pieces of Agnes Mill and Richmond art are there in the collection of David now?

Right now,

for the oil paintings,

there are actually no only two in our house.

Because he did donate one.

And so it's not that we have a lot of Agnes Mill and Richmonds junking up my house.

It's that,

one,

when he first got that first painting, he said, it's a great investment.

And he actually tried to get some friends of ours to buy it as an investment first.

And then when they weren't interested, he said, oh, we need to buy it.

It's a great investment.

It's such a great deal, blah, blah, blah.

And then it becomes.

Quoth Vannis, fine, I'll do it myself.

Yeah.

You're listening to Judge John Hodgman.

I'm Bailiff Jesse Thorne.

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All right,

let's get into it.

We have the two, the two items you mentioned are also featured in our evidence in the show page at maximumfund.org and our social medias.

You might be looking at it right now on YouTube at Judge John Hodgman Pod.

10 Pound Island Gloucester.

Yes.

This is the most recent, it says here, and most expensive of your acquisitions.

Correct.

David, first of all, how would you describe this painting?

What's going on in this painting?

Well,

the answer is nothing.

It's a bunch of rocks.

Well,

there's an art historian I.

tried to show it to and she said, David, you're wrong about everything.

It's a bunch of rocks.

Yeah, well, that's what i said so how are i and your wife wrong well yeah my wife is wrong the other art historian is wrong and and i'm right um and if you look at the painting it's very biomorphic

and uh if you look closer into the painting it might be anthropomorphic I have to pause there for a moment.

Jesse, Jennifer, you may or may not even remember, because Jennifer, this is before your time, but around the time that we had Jason Sims on the program, I made a rule, which is

the first time someone says the word biomorphic on the podcast, that person automatically wins the case, and we end the podcast forever.

So it was great talking to you both.

Well, gotta go.

Can I object?

No, not yet.

Biomorphic, David.

I apologize, Susan, but I just need to dig into this a little bit more.

So

this is a landscape painting.

Yes.

In the distance, you have a strip of land, which has some houses on it, which I would presume to be the village of Gloucester in the 1920s or 30s.

Then you have a strip of ocean.

It's like an inlet.

And in the foreground, you have a line of...

of rocks

covered with a little bit of seaweed and even a little tidal pool in front.

And it's a very pretty painting.

And by biomorphic, do you mean, I'll be the dummy here, the rocks seem to form the shape of a reclining body or something?

Body shaped?

Yes, and they're flesh colored.

And they're...

Well, that's just what it's like in Gloucester.

Have you been there?

Yes, I've been.

I lived in Boston, yes.

So you know all about the fleshy rocks of Gloucester.

There's that famous Dropkick Murphy song about it, The Fleshy Rocks of Gloucester.

It's all about about flesh.

This whole painting is about flesh.

Here we go.

Oh my goodness.

Now it's spicy.

It's so spicy.

It probably belongs in Brooklyn.

Are you suggesting, David?

And

I don't mean to put too fine a point on it, but would you suggest that this painting has vulval qualities?

I would.

All right.

In more than one place in the painting, it's quite remarkable.

David, tell us and your wife, where else are you seeing these bullfists?

And so how much did this one set you back there?

Well, I'm much more interested in this painting now than I was in Minnesota.

Well, absolutely.

Absolutely.

So I contacted the gallery had it for sale out in Laguna Beach for $5,500.

And I said,

I contacted them and they said, oh, we can make a deal on it.

So I waited three years

and then I went back and our finances were looking okay.

I went back and

I heard some muttering from Susan.

Susan,

share your muttering with the rest of us.

Oh, he said he waited three years.

I think he meant three weeks.

How long did you wait before you came up?

Probably six months.

Okay.

Let's say six months.

I'll stipulate six months.

Anyway, so I contacted the gallery and I said,

can you,

what kind of a good price they got?

And then they put a very, very

wonderful person who was my best friend.

David, you must buy this painting.

It belongs.

It's in your heart.

You have to own it.

This is actually your best friend from childhood or someone who pretended to be your best friend to sell you the painting?

No, this is just someone who was very intensely interested in selling it to me.

Yeah.

And she said, well, what would what could you pay?

And I said, I can't pay $5,000.

I could pay $2,000.

And she said, I'll make it happen for you because I love you and I love your story.

You must own it.

That's called art sales.

Yes.

And did you discuss this purchase in advance?

Yes.

With your beloved Susan?

Yes, at least 30 minutes in advance of concluding the sale.

30 minutes.

Did she know how much it was going to cost?

Well, yes, when I told her 30 minutes before the hammer dropped.

Standby, David.

Susan, you offered an objection.

I did not overrule you.

I put a pin in it.

I yearn to hear your objection now, and I would love to hear your side of this particular part of the story.

Well,

yeah.

So he did not spend $5,000 on it.

I think in the end, it set us back about $2,500, which still is a lot of money for us.

We've bought many cars for less than that.

Our current cars are each 16 years old.

So

it's not a normal part.

Are either one of them a Volvo 240 wagon?

Oh, this is, I see where this is going now.

And I don't object to the biomorphic part.

That's a little bit

revisionist.

240 wagons.

What does that symbolize to you?

I want to know what car car you're driving.

Is it a Volvo, a Saab, or a Subaru?

No,

we have a Versa and an Accord.

Okay.

2009.

Very, very, very reasoned, very reasonable, practical cars.

Those are the vehicles, to be clear, those are the vehicles of people who are actually practical and frugal, not the vehicles of people who are enacting practicality and frugality.

That's right.

That's right.

And I don't object about the biomorphic description of this painting.

What I objected to was was the very detailed and specific things he saw and that he started seeing in everything that she, Richmond, and her husband,

Terney,

painted in their landscapes.

And I said, this has gone too far.

You're seeing way too much in here.

And so now he dialed it back to simply more generalized suggestions of bodies and a sense of biomorphism.

But back to the purchasing of the painting.

So

it may have been 30 minutes, but in those 30 minutes, I was waking up.

He brought me a cup of coffee and handed it to me.

I was asleep.

He brought a cup of coffee to me in bed.

And

while I'm trying to wake up and I'm not a morning person and drinking my coffee, he tells me, I've been negotiating with this gallery.

And I have an opportunity.

And they've given me a really good price, but I have to act on it now.

And he's being a little bit sheepish about it, but this had been going on for a long time.

And this is the first I'm hearing of it, which is the same with this and with other, the other, the third painting he bought as well.

I'm finding out after the fact, either he's already promised to buy it or is on the verge of buying it.

And since my default with David is usually yes, I mean, we're frugal so that we can do the things we want.

And with that as my default and with no time to consider it, and even though it was a heck of a lot of money,

I felt pressured and compelled to say, yeah, you can do this.

But I'm not happy about it.

Is this uncharacteristic of David to make large purchases without consulting you?

Yes, it is.

Why do you think he is driven to act out of character in this case?

Well, I think it boils down to his general tendency to really want to acquire things.

He goes through these serial obsessions where he's acquiring things.

It's just that it's always been smaller items.

And in this case, he really just wants everything associated with Richmond.

David, what other kinds of collections do you have?

I have a very, very large Tin Toy collection from the Mark's Tin Toys from the 1930s.

Those are the kind of thing that appear frequently on the Antiques Roadshow.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Have you ever been to the Antiques Road Show?

Never have so you so you have acquired you currently have two oils yes you acquired three one of them has already been donated to a museum correct what museum is is that huntsville museum of art the huntsville museum of art and then susan you mentioned that he had also acquired a a a sculpture called girl deep in thought

by genevieve carr hamlin we have a photo of that jesse do you want to take a look at this and and tell me what the mood that this is conveying

so this appears to be and um

can you tell me what the material here is the base looks like wood but the color looks like bronze it's a mahogany all the the whole thing is one piece of wood

what we're seeing here is a picture of a girl uh with straight bangs and and a dress style that would suggest that maybe she is eight years old right or something like that.

She is standing with her legs tight together, her head down in the palms of her hands.

She looks like she is

in shock or mourning.

Yes.

She looks deeply distressed.

Yes.

It is a very beautiful piece,

very

finely made.

and very expressive.

Yes.

But it is a little distressing.

Yeah,

it's quite striking.

And I'll quote, and I believe this is a quote from you, Susan, here in the description for this exhibit.

C,

now I identify with this poor girl.

She does not look deep in thought to me, despite the title of the sculpture.

She seems deep in distress.

And it is genuinely beautiful.

Like, I want to emphasize that

it is a beautiful thing to look at.

It's not just upsetting.

No, but you feel, you feel, you share some distress with this girl, Susan.

I take it.

I do.

I do.

And it's growing on me.

This is the one that just appeared on.

Trust me, distress is growing on all of us these days.

Yeah, yeah.

I feel that she really is.

If I'd known what was to come, I would have said, yes, maybe that's something we should own.

It really captures the zeitgeist.

But

it was, it just...

I was not consulted about it.

But now that I have it, I enjoy it.

And that's true of all the works.

Once he sneaks them by me and they are in our possession, they grow on me.

I want to learn to love them.

I want to learn from them, which is why it was surprising to me when he up and donated one that wasn't in our house very long and that was growing on me.

And he donated it to a museum.

That's the third oil from the collection, the one that's now in the Huntsville Museum.

Correct.

Gotcha.

Yeah.

So when this piece was presented to you, it didn't yet capture the zeitgeist, but the Susangeist of it was

oh my God, or whatever, another secret piece of art that got acquired without consultation with you.

Correct.

Yeah.

How much did this one go for, David?

I don't know.

$80.

Oh, 80 bucks.

80 bucks.

But this is not an Agnes Mill in Richmond.

No.

This was an artist that was part of the co-op gallery near Central Park that she exhibited with Richmond.

Genevieve Carr Hamlin.

So she's part of the larger world of Agnes.

Exactly.

Is the piece that you donated to the Huntsville Museum

on active display at the Huntsville Museum?

Well, it takes months to get a work of art accepted by a museum.

They have to go through lots of hoops.

And we just got the letter saying that it's accepted.

They're putting a new HVAC in the museum.

I think it's going to to be closed for three months.

But it should be exhibited side by side with the other one.

And I want there to be an exhibition.

That's my goal.

Do you have plans to donate the two Richmond oils that you currently own to other museums?

Well, I would like to donate

the one that Susan loves to the Art Students League

in Manhattan.

Which is the one that you love, Susan.

But Susan wants it.

She doesn't want it donated, but she taught there in 1920.

And I think they should own the painting because it's a teaching painting.

Well, wait a minute.

Susan loves one of these paintings.

Which one do you love?

15 or 15.

Or Fleshy Rocks of Gloucester.

No, not Fleshy Rocks of Gloucester, although he's talked about donating that one, too.

No, he's talking about donating these paintings now.

And I want to keep 15.

I'm quite fond of that painting.

And that's a part of all of this is that I like the art.

We just are not the sort of people who can just buy expensive works of art and turn around and donate them to museums to make sure that they stay in public collections where they can be seen in perpetuity.

So, yeah.

David mentioned that he has a tin toy collection.

How is that kept?

Is that in a pile somewhere or in a display case?

Is it a hoard or a collection?

It's a hoard.

There are some things that are set out, but they're set out in a room that I can hardly walk into because it's, well, it's kind of his office.

And so a lot of things are just stored in boxes in there as well as being on some shelves in there, but not out where people can see them.

So he keeps it into his own personal space.

But a lot of it is no one can see even.

No, he can see it in his mind.

Yeah, right.

He knows that he has it.

Yeah,

it's a little bit of a hoard.

And he's been talking about selling these things to fund his other obsessions for a long time.

What are the other obsessions besides Richmond and Tin Toys?

Well,

he had a phase of going through collecting dropleaf tables and convincing other people to buy dropleaf tables.

And I'm going to sell all these toys and that'll pay for this.

Or I want to buy more tin toys, but I'll sell these older older tin toys to pay for the new tin toys.

And, and yet, very few tin toys have ever left the house.

Susan, I hate to interject here.

We're talking a lot about these tin toys when we could be getting some insight into this dropleaf table collection.

I'm a little speechless there, David.

Because I think, look, I love it.

I love a tin toy.

I'm not a tin toy collector myself, but

I understand their charms entirely.

Like those lithographed tin toys are very beautiful and

evocative

and highly collectible.

Dropleaf tables, it's a good kind of table to have,

but it's a tough thing to collect.

It is.

And it was a very short-lived but intense obsession.

David, what is the appeal of dropleaf tables to you?

And why should they appeal to me and Jesse?

Well, I do have a defense here.

And

in your explanation, I would like to hear the term Volva.

What makes you want to acquire it?

Why do you like them so much?

I like that they occupy a very, very small space when the leaf is dropped and that you can crowd people around it when you want to have a bigger group in a small space.

You like the cleverness and the ingenuity of the construction.

Yeah, I love the flexibility where you can go from tiny to big.

Yeah.

And you can expand from two to six.

You know how one way to go from tiny to big is you take a tiny tin toy and then get 2,000 more of them.

I've done it.

David, your tin toy collection is,

I don't mean to put too fine a point on it, like almost a commodity.

It's pretty fungible.

You could

take those tin toys to an auction.

and I'm sure you know what the best auction house is for tin toys.

Yes, you could have one big auction, and you know, you'd have to pay the auction house their cut, but you could

collect the money pretty easily.

This isn't something that's hard to sell if you're motivated to sell it.

So, if you have the idea of selling it, why haven't you done that?

Well, um,

Susan wasn't really entirely forthcoming because I sold $1,000 in tin toys quite recently.

Is that like five tin toys?

No, they were small cars.

They sold for about $50 a piece.

Came up to about $1,000.

Susan, would you like David to liquidate some more Tin Toys if he's going to continue?

Buying Agnes Mellon Richmond?

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

David, if you took only the Tin Toys that are not currently on display, only the ones that are in piles of boxes in your office,

sent them off to Tin Toys Auctions LLC, we'll say Swan Auction Galleries.

They don't do toys, but

shout out to our friend Nico Lowry.

It would be pretty easy.

How much money do you think would come back?

Are you assuming that the auction house is taking 25%?

Yeah, I think I could probably get 2,000 for the ones that are not on display, and I could probably get another

3,000 or 4,000 for the ones that are on display.

And I'm ready to get rid of all of them.

So you're saying that you're sitting on,

what, $5,000 to $6,000 worth of tin toys?

And John, that's an auction estimate net.

If we're talking about insurance value, what would you...

Just get

to roadshow this thing.

So, David, this is a timely question, right?

Because there is an Agnes Mellon Richmond piece in the wild that you have your eye on.

Yes, but I can't afford that piece.

Somebody else has to buy that.

Oh, what is this piece?

There is a photo of it here that you included as exhibit D.

To me, it looks like another Gloucester piece.

It is a Gloucester piece.

Tell me about this piece, why you love it, and where is it in the world?

It's in New York.

I went to see it recently in a gallery.

Unfortunately, the price is $10,000.

I showed it,

images of it to the curators at the Brooklyn Museum and tried to get them to buy it.

They have no money.

Yeah.

Museums are kind of in a bit of a pickle at the moment.

So this is an item that is on display

and for sale in a gallery in New York City that you think

should be preserved in a museum.

You don't necessarily want it in your home, but in an ideal world, let's say you tripped over a pile of tin toys and discovered a nugget of gold that was worth 20,000 bucks,

that you would acquire this piece and then donate it

to the Huntsville Museum or any museum.

I would donate it to the Gloucester Art Museum, Cape Ann Art Museum.

That's where I would donate it.

But you're not, you're not thinking about acquiring this piece at the moment.

Oh, no.

I want to get rid of all of my Richmond paintings.

Susan, let's go back for a second.

When did he, what time of day did he wake you up to inform you that he was about to close a deal on this $2,500 painting of fleshy rocks?

It was first thing in the morning.

So you had been up all night, David?

Negotiating with your best friend?

Pretty much.

Yeah, yeah.

David,

Susan mentioned that it is part of the ethics of an art historian to not deal in art or at least not purchase or attempt to affect the value of the work that they are studying.

And yet you are doing that.

Why are you violating your ethics on behalf of Agnes Millen Richmond?

Well.

It's an excellent question.

Thank you.

Jennifer Marmor just texted it to me.

Yes.

I need to convince Susan that what we need to do with our art is donate it and not keep it.

In order to not violate your code of ethics.

Exactly.

So keeping the art that you bought without her consultation or permission at some great expense.

Yes.

And which she has all the same forgiven you for and now has come to love the art must now leave the home immediately.

Exactly.

Or else you'll go to artist oriented jail.

Exactly.

Well, that's the way the law works, Susan.

I I don't know.

Well, I mean, but see, and I think you hit on the crux of it.

He used, I think that was one of his ways of manipulating me to agree to these things, even if it was after the fact, is that they were going to increase in value and that he never intended to try to sell these for a profit.

It was just a way of sneaking it by me.

What do you mean?

He told you that one of the reasons to acquire these pieces was that they were valuable and they would increase in valuable, but that he would never sell them.

He would only donate them.

It just doesn't seem like your story is straight here, David.

In a perfect world, I would like to make her so important that museums would buy them from me.

But that's not going to happen in my lifetime.

So I'm going to have to donate them instead.

Speaking of your lifetime,

is there a way

to have these paintings in your home

and donate them?

And look, I'm not implying that any of us is hurtling towards the dark abyss of death.

I'm just saying, is there a way?

Possibly.

Yeah, it is possible that they could be put into a will.

Yeah, that's possible.

Susan, of the two oil paintings in the sculpture that sort of reside within two by Richmond, one associated with Richmond,

which of them would you want to keep if given the option?

Any, all, one?

I mean, I'd like, I would like to keep the original portrait 15, the original portrait that he bought, and the sculpture, of course.

Just from a purely aesthetic point of view, what I want in my house would be with those two things.

And I wouldn't miss the landscape, the fleshy rocks of Gloucester landscape as much.

Are you working on a manuscript, a monograph, a piece of work about, you know, a piece of art history about Agnes Mellon Richmond?

I have a friend who teaches at Berkeley who's going to do the writing, and I'm supplying her with the

all of my research.

Oh, okay, great.

Yeah.

And this is all part of your scheme to increase the value of Richmond so museums will want to collect.

yes yes exactly and how does this not violate your code of ethics or are you just at that period of time in an art historian's life where you're just like

I don't want the paintings in my house because I'll be in art history jail they have to go to museums maybe that's what you deserve for deceiving your wife exactly

true

susan what do you think is going on here for real with David?

Why do you think he loves this stuff so much?

He has always been an amazing art historian.

And in addition,

he's planning to do more writing himself, but he's already presented conference papers about this artist at a national conference and a regional conference and is set up to do some more.

So he's doing the work.

The difference is the way he has turned it into an obsession just to have everything associated with this artist,

to buy it.

He enjoys the buying part of it.

And so it's not just Agnes Mill and Richmond.

It's artists who were associated with her.

Some works of art we haven't even talked about here.

And also just every

vintage magazine and art catalog and books and

things like that that he that are associated with Richmond.

Right, right.

Yeah.

David, I don't have an ArtNet subscription, so I can't look up full auction records.

But as I was sitting here, I went to the auction website Live Auctioneers that compiles auctions from across the country and indeed across the world to some extent and looked in their price results.

I saw a few dozen of her paintings that have sold in the last decade or so.

Yeah.

You know, a not insignificant number.

Many of them sold really good-looking paintings sold for two and three and $400, not unlike the one that you bought from Europe.

Exactly.

So, why are you buying one that costs $10,000?

Oh, I don't want that one.

Why don't you just wait until there are more that cost $300 and buy them?

It's a clock thing.

I don't think I'm going to be alive long enough to get the $300 ones.

Honestly, the first one that you bought at 15 is the most compelling one to me.

I'm with Susan on that.

It's tremendous.

I'd be thrilled to pour it out of my house.

Yeah.

Yeah.

David, you ever see

Avengers Infinity War?

No.

All right, but surely you know

that in order to acquire the Soul Stone,

Thanus had to go to the planet Vormir.

And this is a spoiler for anyone who has not seen this movie and you should see it.

He had to sacrifice in order to collect the Soul Stone.

The red skull told him he had to sacrifice the thing that he loved the most.

Yes.

And he just happened to have his daughter, Gamora, there,

and he threw her over a cliff.

If you had the opportunity

to get this $10,000 Agnes Millen Richmond piece,

or all of the 250 pieces all in one fell swoop, but you had to throw your beloved, you had to sacrifice your beloved Susan.

Would you do it?

No, but I would sell my tin toys.

All right, I think I've heard everything on you too in order to make my decision.

I'm going to go into my chambers.

I'll think it over for a moment.

I'll be back in a moment with my verdict.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

Susan, how are you feeling about your chances in the case right now?

I don't know.

I'm afraid that the judge might be too much of an art lover to

really

hear my concerns.

So

I'm a little worried,

but I'm hoping that I'll at least get some relief.

David, how are you feeling?

Well, I think that Judge John Hodgman is an artist and he understands the importance of funding artists and promoting art to the world in general.

That sort of altruism is the most important thing

to people like the judge.

We'll see what Judge Hodgman has to say about all this when we come back in just a moment.

You know, we've been doing my brother, my brother me for 15 years, and

maybe you stopped listening for a while, maybe you never listened, and you're probably assuming three white guys talking for 15 years, I know where this has ended up.

But no, no, you would be wrong.

We're as shocked as you are that we have not fallen into some sort of horrific scandal or just turned into a big crypto thing.

Yeah, you don't even really know how crypto works.

The only NFTs I'm into are naughty, funny things, which is what we talk about on my brother, my brother, and me.

We serve it up every Monday for you if you're listening.

And if not, we just leave it out back and goes rotten.

So check it out on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right, we're over 70 episodes into our show.

Let's learn everything.

So let's do a quick progress check.

Have we learned about quantum physics?

Yes, episode 59.

We haven't learned about the history of gossip yet, have we?

Yes, we have.

Same episode, actually.

Have we talked to Tom Scott about his love of roller coasters?

Episode 64.

So how close are we to learning everything?

Bad news.

We still haven't learned everything yet.

Oh, we're ruined!

No, no, no, it's good news as well.

There is still a lot to learn.

Woo!

I'm Dr.

Ella Hubber.

I'm regular Tom Long.

I'm Caroline Roper, and on Let's Learn Everything, we learn about science and a bit of everything else too.

And although we haven't learned everything yet, I've got a pretty good feeling about this next episode.

Join us every other Thursday on Maximum Fun.

Judge Hodgman, we're taking a quick break from the case.

You know, I run the Put This On Shop at putthisonshop.com.

I do know that.

All summer long, all spring and summer long indeed,

we are launching a new category of new old products every week.

So basically, this is what happened in the put this on office.

We had literally a backlog of hundreds and hundreds of items,

stuff that we had acquired to put in the shop, but hadn't yet listed.

We are caught up with that backlog and we are launching a new category every week.

We've already done vintage t-shirts, trousers, sunglasses.

I think we're going to have cufflinks right around the corner.

So every week, a new set of stuff at putthisonshop.com.

So there is no excuse not to be checking in.

Make sure and go sign up for the email list so you can get an update when a new category launches.

We'll let you know.

There's all kinds of cool stuff.

You can also follow the put this on shop at put.this.on on Instagram.

All kinds of treasures, not just for dudes, but if you need a gift for a dude in your life, it's a great place to look.

Beautiful antique things and vintage things from all around the world.

Put thisonshop.com.

Well, Jesse, I love putthisonshop.com.

It's a wonderful place to go get gifts for people that you can't think of gifts for, as well as beautiful things that you have collected.

In my life, in a couple of days, I will be taking the stage again at the Wilbur Theater in Boston.

I'll be joining those Doughboys.

for their big Boston show.

It's the 10th anniversary, if you can believe it, of the Dough Boys podcast.

I'm very lucky to be invited to join along with the incredible comedian John Gabris.

We're going to have a great time there at the Wilbur.

If it's not sold out, go sell it out, won't you?

It'll be nice to see you there.

As well, another friend of our podcast, Paul F.

Tompkins, is on the road right now with his Variatopia tour.

In coming days, he will be in Fairfield, Connecticut, Westerly, Rhode Island, Albany, New York at the Egg, as well as Revolution Hall, where we've played in Portland, Oregon, and the Neptune in Seattle.

You won't want to miss this incredible live variety show.

For tickets and details, go to paulftompkins.com slash live.

Tompkins, of course, is spelled T-O-M-P-K-I-N-S.

No H's in it.

No H's in Tompkins.

The H is in Hodgman.

The no H is in Tompkins.

That's how you remember it.

Yeah,

classic mnemonic device.

That's right.

Scroll down a little bit further on that very selfsame page as I just did, and you will learn that the thrilling adventure hour starring Paul, Padgett Brewster, Mark, Evan Jackson, Busy Phillips, Joshua Molina, Mark Gagliarty, Craig Gakowski, Autumn Reeser, Annie Savage from Dick Town, Hal Lublin, Janet Varney, and let's just say some special guests will be coming back for the first time in a long time to the Bell House here in Brooklyn.

The 7 p.m.

show is already sold out.

9:30 p.m.

tickets are still available, and then they travel along to London as well.

This is also an incredible show that you don't get to see very often.

So go check out paulftompkins.com slash live for all those details and get over to putthison shop.com for all the details that you can accoutrement yourself with when you go to see a wonderful show.

Let's get back to the case.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman re-enters the courtroom and presents his verdict.

Now, it's long settled law that

the difference between a collection and a hoard is a display case.

And Thanos was a collector, not a hoarder, because he had an incredible display case.

It was called a gauntlet.

He was looking for five space jewels to put them into a gauntlet so that he could snap his finger and wipe out half of all life

in order to make the remaining life happier and more sustainable in a universe of limited resources.

That was his idea.

The reason why Infinity War and Endgame

should together have won the best picture Oscar both years,

because they are true works of art as far as I'm concerned.

Is that Thanos' idea was dumb?

Everyone could see that Thanos' idea was dumb, both in the universe of the films and certainly on the Reddit boards discussing it.

Like, if he could snap his fingers, if the issue was

limited resources,

and collecting all five infinity stones into the infinity gauntlet meant that he could do anything, manipulate time, space, reality, minds, anything.

anything.

Indeed, he could snap his fingers and wipe out all half of all higher life.

Why couldn't he snap his fingers and make the universe twice as big,

twice as resourceful?

And then, well, then they'll just population will get out of control again.

Guess what?

Four times as big.

Just keep going.

He could have done that if he were rational.

But by the time he said, fine, I'll do it myself, he had long gone past rationality.

The reason that

Thanos did what he did and the reason that his character is so interesting

is that when he was a younger man, he had this idea on Titan

before the Infinity Stones came up in his mind.

to get rid of half of all life on Titan in order to make life bearable in a system of limited resources.

And they, the other folks around him, rightly said, no, you're out of your mind.

What Thanos was,

and then Thanos heard of the Infinity Stones and said, fine, I'll do it myself.

And went and got those stones and did it.

Not because his idea was a good one, but because he had become obsessed.

He had had an idea, which, by the way, was technically correct.

Titan perished because of overpopulation.

And his dumb, murderous, horrific scheme might have saved them from that.

But he had to do what he did because he had been told he was wrong.

And then he had seen that he was right.

And he had become so focused on this idea that he could no longer see any alternative.

It's a story of obsession for which he sacrifices a tremendous amount, including

his daughter, Gomorrah.

And this is a spoiler, David, if you haven't seen it.

He also sacrifices your wife, Susan.

Weird plot twist.

This is what makes the story so compelling to me, that it's a bad idea, and yet one that he must follow through on.

It's an idea that takes root in his mind.

David, you saw,

you made contact with a lot of enablers in your journey so far.

That best friend at that gallery, your friend in Berkeley who's writing this thing, whose parents have an inventory of the entire collection.

You saw that 250 list of Richmond works and associated works, and that is your infinity gauntlet.

You want to fill it up,

even though it causes you pain, because what you are doing

is violating a code of ethics that you take seriously as an art historian.

You're not supposed to be an art collector.

You're supposed to be an art studier.

And then you get these things

and you love them, but you don't want them in your home, both out of the Indiana Jones principle, that belongs in a museum, which was a nice way

to explain colonial theft of antiquities.

It's a

different thing here.

But also because it gives you pain and anxiety because you know you're not supposed to be hoarding this stuff.

You're not supposed to be assembling this infinity gauntlet.

You know better.

You're supposed to be studying these things.

You want to get them.

You have the acquisitive impulse and you want to let them go.

That said, now that that's clear,

now that you, I think, David, perhaps have some greater insight into yourself than Thanos ever did, you might be able to escape Thanos' punishment,

which is it all gets undone.

And he sacrifices everything for nothing.

And he was wrong.

And he feels pain and sadness for losing his daughter and your wife, Susan, which is a weird plot twist in a movie.

Because frankly,

you are beyond the depths of the universe where the ethics of the art historian don't matter anymore.

You have a quest.

And having a quest is noble, especially if the quest is so noble as

I want to lift up the legacy of this artist and make her better known and make her world better known, including.

the world that she curated for herself and the cooperative where she lifted up other artists.

This is a valuable quest.

And once you are able to lay down the fact that you are no longer an art historian, in this case, but an advocate and a mad Titan, much like Thanos,

your hobby no longer becomes acquisition, but rather facilitation.

of bringing this work to light, which from time to time means

finding work that you can afford and donating it to a a museum that you care about.

This is a valuable hobby to have.

The reason that I asked if you had a Volvo 240 diesel wagon is not because I wanted to peg you into some kind of

cliche,

because you remind me both in your, you're individual human beings in your own right, but you remind me both of David Reese's parents, Peg and Phil Reese.

Phil was an art librarian at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill for years and years.

And Peg, he passed away

two years ago.

Peg is still alive.

She was

one of the first computer programmers

of her generation.

Incredible people who

lived a vibrant life well, well into their later life, long past retirement.

where their hobbies and you know building houses for habitat for humanity their hobbies their their engagement in their congregation in the Episcopalian church, their social outreach and their interests were remained as vibrant as they always were.

And I thought, that's a wonderful way to live.

Phil passed away, as I say, a couple of years ago.

He was 92, and I don't think he lived an unfulfilled day in his life.

This is a wonderful thing for you to be doing in your retirement.

And good news, you don't have a university to be fired from at this time for crossing the line.

So I think it's time to drop the pretense of being an art historian and instead embrace the mission.

And the other pretense, or I should say, the other pain-causing wrinkle that it is time to iron out is, you got to talk to your wife about this.

Like you have a, this is a, this whole problem has a simple solution.

You got a bunch of tin toys that you are already over to fund your research, your acquisition, your mission.

And also, you have this wonderful wife who is completely understanding that if you talked to her about, maybe not completely understanding, but has understanding.

And if you talked about her and say, this is what the mission is, these are the funds I have to work with.

These are the kinds of things that I want to acquire.

I'm not going to put our house and life in danger.

And I want to, and I will confer with you when there are

big questions, financial questions, about whether something is within my reach and how I'm going to fund the purchase of it and what my plan is beyond that.

And even listen to your wife, too, when she says, I'm not ready to let go of that one.

15 is a beautiful piece of art.

You put me through this.

Let me look at it for a little bit.

Put it in the, figure out another plan for it.

Perhaps you will will it to a museum in the 1,000 years from now when none of us are alive.

That, this whole problem had this solution that you didn't need me for, right?

Which is to

drop the complicating factors.

Acknowledge what you are, a mad Titan with an extra gauntlet with 250 holes in it that you want to fill up with beautiful jewels of art

as best you can and within your means.

You're not someone who's going to sacrifice your wife in order to get a piece of art.

but you will instead consult with her and make her part of the project.

I hope, Susan, that that will alleviate the concerns and surprises and the feelings of not exactly being heard as David goes forward in this march across the cosmos.

But I do essentially find in his favor and enable him to march across the cosmos looking for these works of art, so long as you are doing it in good faith.

with who you are and the relationship that you share and you don't sell your house.

This is the sound of a gavel.

I am

inevitable.

Judge John Hodgman rules that is all.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

David, how are you feeling in your mad titanom?

I feel confident that I can complete my mission.

How do you feel about the ruling generally?

I like it.

I like it.

I have to do much, much better with

Susan and my therapist degrees mightily.

Susan, how do you feel?

Well, if he can

follow the ruling, then I think this is something that can work.

It remains to be seen whether or not I have to bring him back for violating the, you know, what is that?

Like violating, he's out on parole right now.

I don't know.

But also I'm pleased because now I can finally get him to watch Endgame and Infinity War with me, which I've seen, but he's never seen it.

And now he's going to want to see it.

And that's going to be fun.

So I am looking forward to that unexpected result.

Thank you, Susan.

Thank you, David.

Thank you both for joining us on the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Another Judge John Hodgman case is in the books.

We'll have Swift Justice in just a second.

First, our thanks to Redditor, Old Tech, New Specs for naming this week's episode Objection to Art.

If you want to name a future episode, join us on the Maximum Fun subreddit or slash Maximum Fun.

That's where we chat about episodes and ask for suggestions for cases.

You can find us on Instagram at Instagram.com slash judgejohnhodgman.

We're also on TikTok and YouTube at judgejohnhodgman pod, where you can watch full video of every episode on YouTube and awesome highlights on TikTok.

Follow, subscribe, comment if you please.

Speaking of commenting, did you know, John, that there are comments enabled on podcast episodes on Spotify?

Yeah, that's absolutely true.

In fact,

one Spotify user, I really enjoyed this comment.

I can't pronounce their name because it's spelled 22MS6JVVP3EOBHZW76ED4INA.

It's just their prodigy email address.

Yeah.

Well, if you're listening, you know who you are.

You wrote, I know no one cares, but I nailed the obscure cultural reference for once and I'm so proud.

Hey, we do care.

We love it when people guess the cultural references.

So if you're watching on YouTube or you're listening on Spotify or anywhere where you can leave a comment, make sure that you let us know when you got it right.

Make sure you let us know if there's an obscure cultural reference that we should have given, given the nature of the case.

We love your comments.

We love reading them.

We love reading them out loud here on the podcast.

And thank you, as always, for listening.

sharing, subscribing, liking, commenting, and doing everything across

Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocketcast, YouTube, wherever you get your podcast to help people find the show.

It really does help.

And this week,

a i'm making a specific request here this week john yeah i thought this was a really fun episode email it to somebody oh yeah text message it to somebody just say i bet you would think about somebody in your life that maybe loves art think about somebody that loves not telling their partner about things

think about

Think about somebody in your life that this might enjoy this episode and send it over to them and say, I bet you would like this episode of Judge John Hodgman.

I love that podcast.

Yeah.

And YouTube makes it really easy to see the evidence.

So if you haven't been checking out the YouTube at Judge John Hodgman pod and you want to see those fleshy rocks of Gloucester in real time, and then you want to share it with somebody, just click that share button and it pops right up.

Send them a link.

YouTube really is one of the places where people are discovering new podcasts every day, including ours.

So that is really helpful.

So yeah, email it, send it, send it around.

Judge John Hodgman was created by Jesse Thorne and John Hodgman.

This episode engineered by Judah Walker at Bard and Glass in Huntsville, Alabama.

Our social media manager, Dan Telford, the podcast edited by A.J.

McKeon, our video editor is Daniel Spear.

By the way, this week, John,

extra thanks to Judah Walker at Bard and Glass in Huntsville, Alabama.

I noticed that not only did he engineer that session, but that studio was locked and loaded, ready to go.

almost 20 minutes before our start of recording time, as opposed to the frequent, the all-too-frequent situation, which is I hear Jennifer Marmer on the board being like, okay, but could you give them headphones to listen in with?

Because otherwise there's going to be a feedback loop.

I did ask you about supplying microphones at one point.

Yeah, so thank you to thank you to Judah and Bard and Glass.

If you need a studio in Huntsville, sounds like that's a great option.

Jennifer Marmer is, of course, the producer of this program.

Now, Swift Justice, where we answer small disputes with quick judgment.

Are you ready with a quick judgment, John?

I am ready.

Giglian from the Maximum Fun sub on Reddit says, my husband takes the trash out every day, even if the bin is not full.

I'm not going to ask him to stop since he does the trash.

But I think this is wrong.

You should only take the trash out if the bin is more than 50% full.

I'm glad they're drawing a line in the sand and asking him to stop.

They just want the moral position.

That's right.

One of the classic examples of the great marital conflict between principle and practice.

In principle, would it be, I guess, less wasteful of trash bags to wait until it is full before taking it out?

I suppose.

In practice, maybe something stinks in there.

Maybe it's just easier for the person who's doing the work to do that work on a daily part of their daily routine rather than wait and wait and wait, giggling until you're ready.

And in practice, by the way, you're not doing it.

So you're wrong.

Giglian's husband gets to do it the way they're doing it.

I'm sorry about the waste of trash bags, but maybe there's a reason you don't smell

three-day-old clam chowder in your house.

Speaking of division of labor between work and hobbies, it was so fun to talk about David's obsession with Agnes Mill and Richmond.

That name again is Agnes Mill in Richmond.

If you want to go and buy a bunch of Agnes Mill and Richmond paintings, won't you let him know?

So at least he can check it off on his checklist of 250 pieces of Agnes Mill and Richmond.

But if there's someone in your life who's got a hobby that you think is a little too passionate, maybe a little out of control, we want to hear about it.

Did your roommate take up tie-dye and now you have buckets of old smelly water and a bunch of rubber bands all over the place?

Does your partner knit cute things for everyone, but not for you?

Is there a collection in your home that has creeped too far into the common spaces?

Tell me about your hobby disputes at maximumfun.org slash jjho.

And of course, it doesn't have to be a dispute about hobbies.

We take them all and we judge them all at maximumfun.org slash jjho.

Please get in a dispute with somebody and then send it to us so that we can have a podcast.

maximumfun.org slash jjho.

We'll talk to you next time on the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

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