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The Artpop Talk Thanksgiving Day Parade
136 Plays2 years ago
When I was a young boy…. I stuffed my face with turkey and watched the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade! This episode is all things parade, starting with victory marches and Triumphal Arches and the Panathenaic Procession. Pop Culture will lend itself to parade commercialism, floats, bands, balloons, and angsty teenager fandom.
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Transcript
Start of the Holiday Season with Mariah Carey
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello, hello, and welcome to Art Pop Talk. I'm Bianca. And I'm Gianna. Well, Bianca, Miss Mariah Carey has announced the official start to the holiday season, but it feels to me like she's forgotten something. You know what, Gianna? I agree, Mariah. Here's the thing. We are just as excited as you are to listen to All I Want for Christmas is You. Great song. However,
00:00:26
Speaker
We should listen to it as soon as Santa Claus crosses the finish line at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. And not one moment more. Today we're talking about the visual history of parades and what has led us to ring in the holiday season by watching a bunch of giant balloons walk down the New York City streets. Plus the dog show.
Gianna's Engagement Story
00:00:46
Speaker
You know, so we've got Santa and then after that we have the dog show. And you've got a great mix to kick off your giant cookie eating streak.
00:00:55
Speaker
Let's talk turkey. Gianna. Hi. Hi. Okay, I'm really excited for this chitty chatty segment because it's time for you to make an announcement. I suppose it is time to make the announcement. So I told you guys that I was going to Arkansas.
00:01:17
Speaker
You know, I was going to go pop around, have a little murderino time in the town of Hot Springs at the Gangster Museum. Yeah, I did not go to the Gangster Museum whatsoever. You were busy. I was very busy. So I got engaged.
00:01:36
Speaker
Yay! Yay! Yes, so it is official. She's got the ring. She had the moment. And it was really cute. It was cute for me anyways.
00:01:53
Speaker
i love that journey for you yeah i love a cute proposal moment yeah i will say it was just so funny whenever you were talking about this trip to arkansas because obviously i've known about what has been really gonna happen in arkansas you're like this bitch wasn't going to know gangster museum like yeah so like every time you had to talk about arkansas i was like trying to pretend like what are you going
00:02:16
Speaker
Oh, what are you doing in Arkansas again? Or, you know, on the podcast, you're like, yeah, we're going to Arkansas. I was like, oh, yeah, that's cool. I like trying to act like I didn't care about how you're going to Arkansas. But I'm so excited. And I will say, Phoebe and put together.
00:02:33
Speaker
this adorable video of like all of our friends and family members and everyone gave like a little congratulations and then he put it all together and I got to watch it. I was just bawling my eyes out whenever I watch this little video. It was so sweet. Yeah the video was really cute. So we went to this place in Arkansas called the Gardener Gardens and it's owned by the university
00:02:57
Speaker
And it's also where the Anthony Chapel is, which is one of three chapels with really beautiful kind of like natural exposed windows kind of architecture. And so that's kind of around where he proposed and also where we went to go watch the video. And there's this like cute little like older couple that
00:03:16
Speaker
took our photo for us, but this sweet couple was like, oh wait, can we take a picture of you? For us, this would be such a cute memory for us. And they were telling us about a very short conversation, but how they've been married for a really long time.
Thanksgiving Plans and Wedding Talk
00:03:34
Speaker
it was just like cute. I was like people are nice you know and yeah that chapel is honestly really gorgeous. I've been wanting to see it for a while so if you're ever interested in that area definitely like we were recommended to go during the fall and I must say like the aesthetic I was here for it so you know he did a good job there was there's a lot of thought and uh yeah so now I get the honor of um
00:04:01
Speaker
adding another thing to my plate and getting ready for all the wedding things but I feel as though we need to put our attention into the next APT wedding which is of course fashion expert Juliana Poros. I love a good APT wedding I'm so excited I'm so excited for Juliana Poros and I'm so excited that over you know the holidays you and I can
00:04:26
Speaker
start talking about planning yes and i don't think i with like thanksgiving and of course i'm gonna see you over christmas like my brain is definitely like not on like wedding stuff right now like at all uh and there's still a lot of people i just haven't
00:04:43
Speaker
been able to like see to even like have drinks or like celebrate, you know, it is still kind of like a weird time.
Thanksgiving Food Traditions
00:04:50
Speaker
So yeah, my brain definitely isn't ready for it. Yeah, I don't think until I see you, it'll be like, okay, I'm ready. I'm so ready. I'm so excited.
00:05:00
Speaker
I just like random people asking me like I was talking about You and Theven to just like someone I met I was like, oh my sister just got engaged I was like a Diwali event and this girl is from Malaysia and I was saying how my you know future brother-in-law's from Malaysia and
00:05:17
Speaker
And they were like, or they were like, oh, does she have a date yet? I love that question. Like, do they have a date yet? I was like, oh my God, this is so exciting. No, I have
Adrian Grenier's Art Collaboration
00:05:32
Speaker
no clue. That's a great question. Follow up with her in a hot minute.
00:05:36
Speaker
I'll let her know. Yeah well I feel as though to you know Bianca and I really just love to do the holiday season some good justice which is why I'm not ready for Christmas yet. We are like a Thanksgiving kind of family. I love like yellow and brown food for the win. That's all I
00:05:54
Speaker
I want to eat. And we just had Deepavali and Diwali. So Theban and I did things for that this weekend. And then we have Thanksgiving this month. And then we will have Christmas. And oh my gosh, can I just tell you, last night, there's a new Netflix movie. And it's about this girl who gets catfish. It's called Love. Like, love her. I saw the trailer for that. It popped up on Netflix. I was like, what the hell is this movie?
00:06:18
Speaker
fucking christmas thing. I was like what the actual fuck and so it looks really good and like I want to watch it because I love watching like the cringy like Vanessa Hutchins Netflix movies like I eat that shit up I'm not ready for it and Phoebe was like oh like
00:06:35
Speaker
This looks, you know, really good. Like some catfishing Asians. And I was like, no, I really want to watch it. I'm just not ready for it. And he was like, but Netflix told us to watch it. Like if it's not time, then why would it be here? And oh, my God, we got into this whole thing. And I firmly stand that I am I'm not ready to watch it. And I will start watching those movies maybe on Thanksgiving. Like this is going to be a chill Thanksgiving. And that will be the earliest I will watch it.
00:07:05
Speaker
Well, you know, speaking of brown and yellow on Thanksgiving, this year I'm spending Thanksgiving with the fam up here in Delaware.
00:07:17
Speaker
And a staple in the Martucci think household is pigs in a blanket, like cheesy pigs in a blanket. And it's because of you. I just think they're so, I just love them. It's because I used to be a really piggy eater when I was a kid, but now on Thanksgiving, I still really want pigs in a blanket. And I feel like I'm going to have to disgrace the Poro table.
00:07:47
Speaker
So we were just talking about before we hopped on to record that there's truly no hope for us because the bouginess is like ingrained in our DNA and how Bianca
00:08:00
Speaker
Wanted to go to Vermont to get a Christmas tree because of course she needs a fucking Vermont II kind of tree and How one of our aunts just picked out her Christmas tree like she goes before Thanksgiving like it's very competitive like you need to get that good tree you got a tag I truly think that pigs in a blanket is probably
00:08:20
Speaker
where we humble ourselves. I think they're gonna be horrified. There's all this delicious fruit and I just want some brown pigs in a blanket. I know. Is this your first or second Thanksgiving? It's your second. Well, this is going to be my first Thanksgiving at the Pura House because last year
00:08:39
Speaker
We obviously wanted to do Thanksgiving, but it just got canceled because of COVID. The risk was just too much for everyone to be in the same place. So I hosted a little mini Thanksgiving with Joel Poirot, fashion expert, and Andrew last year at my apartment. So we just had a little party of three for Thanksgiving last year. So I'm really looking forward to it. I really love Thanksgiving. Yeah, it's a good one.
00:09:04
Speaker
Well, speaking of, should we move along here and get into some art news?
Immersive vs Installation Art
00:09:14
Speaker
All right, so for today, I have a little celebrity art news. You may know him as the real villain who stopped Anne Hathaway, aka Andrea, aka Andy Sachs, from taking the fashion world by storm, one cerulean sweater at a time. But turns out, Jarlsberg grilled cheese sandwiches aren't the only thing this villain chef can flip.
00:09:39
Speaker
Actor Adrian Grenier is working with 21C Museum Hotel in Nashville to flip one of their contemporary suites into an immersive experience. Get this about narcissism, the digital age, and also the paparazzi. So Grenier is one of three artists invited to participate and the deal came about with a friendship of the Hotel Cone founder Steve Wilson,
00:10:02
Speaker
which I've been familiar with him as a collector, having worked for 21c for a bit. To quote Grenier, he says, I was telling him about a project I'd done a while back called Teenage Paparazzo and the art I created and how I'd started to accumulate so much I needed to open up my own hotel.
00:10:19
Speaker
This collection, which was basically designed to get people off their digital media devices and activate into three-dimensional spaces, having conversations in the real time and with real people. So then Wilson responded, don't do that. Why don't you just curate one of the rooms at our new hotel in Nashville? And he did just that. So his documentary, Teenage Paparazzo,
00:10:43
Speaker
is from 2010, and it's about an encounter with a 14-year-old paparazzo, Austin Wijdek. So basically this project is about how Grenier decided to turn the cameras onto Wijdek in an effort to gain insight into what motivates people to stalk
00:11:00
Speaker
and particularly stock the famous. So all these pieces in this hotel room return to the theme of self-reflection, how we are viewed and how we interact with the media. Other artists and works of art are also featured in the space. There is an appropriation of, I believe, a water house painting in there about, you know, narcissism and the God associated with that. Grenier feels today that the focus on social media causes
00:11:29
Speaker
some to quote retreat into the safety of the channels that confirm our own bias and reflect our ego and identity. It's a new time, he says, and it's interesting to watch who's considered also famous. Now that we all have access, what do we do with our own power? Are we going to use it for something positive and uplifting and healthy for our society? Or are we going to seek the same narcissism and attention and ego
00:11:59
Speaker
that classic celebrities have. I wanted to share this topic for Art News 1 just because I think 21c is an interesting thing to keep your eye on. I work at a gallery that has an immersive art experience on display and I think
00:12:20
Speaker
Bianca and I are getting increasingly closer and closer to having an episode about immersive art and spaces like Meow Wolf and how we feel about that type of art. And we see immersive art taking in spaces like hotel rooms. You know, 21c is something that is kind of taking this to the forefront, but also there are a lot of Airbnbs that are doing this. It's really interesting. A classic example I use
00:12:46
Speaker
to look for immersive art in private spaces is Airbnb. You can stay at the first original blockbuster now that they're out of business. And it's all kind of like vintage vibes in there where you can watch tapes instead of CDs. And that's really cool. And that's an immersive art experience. So I'm interested in what this hotel is doing in regards to that facet of contemporary art.
00:13:12
Speaker
Other than kind of looking at the project and watching some previews about teenage paparazzo, I don't know much about it, but you know, I think it is interesting for a celebrity to talk about narcissism. I think we can also talk about the privilege and how Grannier has access to this collector, Steve Wilson, and just through
00:13:33
Speaker
a conversation and a friendship, he's able to participate in this. What does it mean to have access to collectors? I think it could also be fair to say that maybe this topic of narcissism could be hypocritical, but I think there also is more to it. Maybe to put our bias aside and get past the hypocrisy, Bianca, what do you think of this project and maybe what 21c is doing with their immersive spaces?
00:14:02
Speaker
Yeah, I think I will have a lot to say. I know we have had the idea of doing kind of an immersive art episode for a while. So I have a lot of opinions about the trend of immersive art spaces. But I think as a whole, this is actually like really interesting conceptually and I'm here for it. I'm here for
00:14:30
Speaker
a celebrity kind of breaking through into the
History of Parades
00:14:33
Speaker
art world. I don't have a problem with that. And I think that what I like about this in particular is that he's not just kind of a collector talking about his art and putting on a wall. I think I like that it's in a public space. I like that it's being used to have this type of public conversation. And I like that he's involving himself with that, especially given that, you know, the topic is
00:14:59
Speaker
about the paparazzi, I think that putting that type of conversation out on display for a celebrity to be involved with is super interesting. And yeah, I like the concept about kind of stalking the stalker. I think that's... I think it's clever. Yeah, I think it is really clever. So no, I'm here for it. I think, again, on the other hand, I do have thoughts and opinions about
00:15:27
Speaker
Immersive art experiences both, you know positively and negatively And this reminds me so much of our Conversation we had about architectural digest and how we talked about that's what I was thinking too. Yeah how You know, we can talk about the privilege about who has access to you know Be able to pay money to stay in this week if it's just for one night or multiple nights you know, I can't speak for all of the 21c hotels and
00:15:55
Speaker
But I think it's also important to point out the location of these hotels. They're predominantly in the Midwest, or the first one was in Kentucky. And what they're doing is they're looking to bring contemporary art to the Midwest. And I think also get over the stigma that it's not already here. So I think that's already, the location is providing access to these kinds of experiences that you don't find on the east and west coast. So that's breaking a barrier. But sometimes,
00:16:25
Speaker
installation art is called to be viewed and experienced for long periods of time and we don't all have access and the means to do that. So that is part of the conversation and we have talked about that before. Right and I also think I'm not sure exactly how this piece is set up but I think
00:16:44
Speaker
just maybe a note to end on and something to look forward to in future conversations is the difference between installation art and an art immersion experience. I think in our contemporary culture, obviously there are equations where they can be on the same playing field, but I think that
00:17:07
Speaker
for what we're discussing and things like Meow Wolf. Like Meow Wolf is different than a piece of installation art. So yeah, I'm excited to kind of.
00:17:16
Speaker
dive into that a little deeper later on. But this is cool. I'm here for it. I like it. He's redeemed himself. He's redeemed himself. Is he a villain? Yeah. And I encourage you guys to also, you can follow 21c because you can look at what their other specialty suites do. There was one for a while that was kind of also playing into pop culture, which was super interesting when the chess playing Netflix show, what was that called?
00:17:45
Speaker
Queen's Gambit. Queen's Gambit. When that came out there was like a trust board on the ceiling and one of the 21c suites there's also one where you basically it's like a recording studio and that's really cool too. Nice. Yeah so something to keep an eye on. But are we ready to get into today's art pop talk? I think so. For today's art pop talk
00:18:13
Speaker
We are getting into the giving spirit by bringing you this festive episode, talking about all things parade. From the Panathenaic procession and Ferris Bueller's Day off to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. How are parades used in holiday celebrations and historically used to show triumph or victory?
00:18:34
Speaker
All righty, so I am going to bring us a little introduction into this kind of, I don't know if it's necessarily a history of parades, but this is kind of the lineage that Gianna and I felt best related to kind of our contemporary example of parades and how we're kind of going to fall into that use of the topic in an art historical sense. So the word parade comes to the English language from
00:19:03
Speaker
French, where it traces back to a middle French word meeting to prepare. And in the original English language, parades, of course, did require preparation. When the English started using the word parade in the mid 1600s, it did refer to this kind of like French use of the word, like a very pompous show or an exhibition, like to parade something. And the French have continued to use the word in that
00:19:33
Speaker
in that way as reference to, again, that pompous show. And then for a public procession, the kind that we're going to get into, they actually use the words defilé. So the use of the word that we are most familiar with, this kind of public procession kind, dates back to the 1600s, but some of the earliest of these public processions were very sober. They were very commemorative.
00:19:59
Speaker
They could have been political and obviously we'll get into this kind of like triumphal history as well. So by the late 1800s, the word parade was more frequently referring to the kinds of parades that we're most familiar with today, those that are very celebratory.
00:20:16
Speaker
If you aren't familiar with many ancient Roman arches, you have definitely seen their influences, so the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, the Arch in Washington Square Park in New York, or the Wellington Arch in London. While some of these arches were erected by rulers or for commemorative purposes, they harken back to Roman architecture.
00:20:37
Speaker
Of course, the technology from the arch was innovative and distinctive to the Roman Empire, and this was actually perhaps influenced by the Etruscans, which we know very little about. But with the building of aqueducts, bridges, and amphitheaters like the Colosseum, we really see this arch
00:20:54
Speaker
architectural form take place. The modern term triumphal arch, what we now call it in art history, derives from the notion that this form of architecture was connected to the award and commemoration of a triumph to particularly successful Roman generals, and this actually originally took place by vote of the Roman senate.
00:21:17
Speaker
The earliest types of arches that were set up to commemorate this triumph were made in the time of the Roman Republic and these were called fornices and they bore imagery that described and commemorated the victory.
00:21:31
Speaker
Lucius Stereontinus is known to have erected two of these fornices in roughly 196 BCE to commemorate his victories in Hispania. However, none of these structures, these fornices, have actually survived and there's very little that is known about these type of appearances.
00:21:51
Speaker
And then we have the Roman triumphal practices that come a little bit later. And they changed significantly at the start of the imperial period when Augustus decreed that triumphs and triumphal honors were to be confined to members of the imperial family, basically meaning the emperor and his antecedents. The term fornax was then replaced by arcus, which means obviously where we get arch.
00:22:19
Speaker
While Republican fornices could be erected by a triumphateur at their own discretion and expense, these imperial triumphal arches were sponsored by the decree of the Senate or sometimes wealthy holders of high office to honor or to promote
00:22:36
Speaker
emperors and their office and of course the values of the empire. So arches were not necessarily built as entrances. That's kind of an important quality of theirs. Unlike many modern triumphal arches, we oftentimes kind of see different gate forms or entrances to an old city. That's kind of like the Brandenburg Gate in
00:22:57
Speaker
Berlin, that is a type of entrance. Arches were not built in that way. They were erected specifically across roads and were intended to be passed through and not around.
00:23:13
Speaker
in a processional manner. So this leads to that triumphant processional or triumphant parade. By the fourth century CE, there were 36 arches in Rome, and a few of them have survived. So you may know the Arch of Titus, the Arch of Septimus Severus, and the Arch of Constantine.
00:23:36
Speaker
In thinking about these kind of celebratory victory parades, this tradition, you know, is definitely seen today. And I was kind of thinking about how this can be perceived as part of like a political facade as propaganda or equally as a celebration, depending on kind of what side of the political spectrum you're on. Particularly, you know, I was kind of thinking about Joe Biden and Kamala Harris's presidential parade on Inauguration Day, but
00:24:05
Speaker
know presently across the globe there's no doubt that we see these type of like political powers exhibited from the tradition of this kind of like triumphal procession and we don't necessarily have a ton more time to talk about this but again going or leaning more towards that celebratory sense um and less of kind of like that political and victory sense um i wanted to mention the greek
00:24:29
Speaker
panathenaic procession which is depicted on the frieze of the Parthenon and there were actually two festivals to mark Athena's birthday. One was every year and then there was kind of like the grand panathenaic festival every four years. This festival you know had dancing, it was followed by kind of athletic and musical and dramatic contests and then on the last day of the festival the panathenaic procession
00:24:55
Speaker
was led by men carrying animals, which would be sacrificed to Athena. There were these women carrying drinking vessels and musicians that played for women of noble birth who held the sacred peplos, which is featured across the sculptures within the frieze. You can see the peplos being carried as well.
00:25:19
Speaker
This parade followed the Panathenaic Way, which cuts across the middle of the Acropolis. And then in the festival's grand finale, the peplos was placed on the statue of the Athena Polyus in the Erechtheion. So I think that the Roman Arches was maybe the most natural place that we were kind of led to, but I didn't want to ignore the kind of, again, celebratory
00:25:44
Speaker
sense of procession that we do see throughout kind of art history and our traditions as well. Yeah, so for those of you who don't know as well, peplos are the garments worn by Greek women during the like early archaic kind of classical Hellenistic period as well. So I just wanted to define that for you all if you didn't know and like why that freeze is also just so important, not only like
00:26:09
Speaker
For the the tradition also like who's in line like who is walking when what is the path that they're walking and like what are they wearing?
Evolution of Parade Floats
00:26:18
Speaker
It's it's really really fascinating and is is really important you know Bianca this is gonna sound so wild but
00:26:27
Speaker
The way that typically we break our episodes up and which you guys are familiar with is we kind of each take a section, whether that's historical or whether that's a pop culture aspect. So with Bianca doing historical today, I really wasn't thinking about the arches so much. Surprisingly, I mean, we were able to go see the arch in Berlin, obviously, like super, super important. And when I was thinking of these like victory walks, especially coming in from like, you know, conquering another territory,
00:26:56
Speaker
I was thinking about those practices, but my brain totally was not thinking about arches and triumphal arches, so I'm so glad that you brought that up because I was thinking more of the performative act, not the physical marker that we have, which is the main visual part that we have.
00:27:13
Speaker
No, totally. I think that's also really interesting is like parades in general, they kind of have this ephemeral quality where they pop up one day and like even as we'll get into with Macy's, like we have these like humongous, you know, markers of a parade, but they're not long lasting. And I think that's what's, you know, interesting about kind of that lineage within art history is like, especially, you know, the
00:27:38
Speaker
the frieze of the Parthenon, like that depicts like a very important parietal kind of like procession that we have. And then those markers, I think also with the arches, we're kind of so used to them today as existing as like single standing objects, like we're not, whenever we view them, we're kind of looking at them as a static piece of art. And sometimes we're not always recognizing like the action that came with that.
00:28:05
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, for sure. Well, I'm hoping also to get a little bit more into the action. I also am going to talk about more modern garments as well, just a little bit in regards to like band uniforms, too. Yeah. So this was kind of a really interesting subject today that was pressed upon us by boy of APT.
00:28:22
Speaker
Andrew James actually, which is very helpful. And we are excited for next week's episode when we get into feasting. But parades is a really big huge part of holiday culture, of small town culture.
00:28:38
Speaker
national culture so it really hits all these kind of tick marks. But for today I'm gonna start out talking about floats and a little bit of like parade iconography that comes with that. So the first reference to any vehicle resembling a parade float comes from Greece in about 500 BCE when a statue of the god of Dionysus was created from his temple in a festival car.
00:29:03
Speaker
pulled by two men typically. And this procession was part of an opening ceremony for a stage drama or performance and was designed to gain favor for both the God and the drama critics.
00:29:16
Speaker
So parades continue to be an important form of celebration and often featured kings, conquerors, and any other nobles writing in this kind of decorated carriage. The Emperor Maximilian of Germany was one of the first to commission an artist to design a, quote, triumphal car for his parade in 1515.
00:29:39
Speaker
The cars were decorated with bells, fancy fabrics, and the carvings of flowers, fruits, and other mythical creatures. We have some parade controversy as well, which pops up in the middle ages.
00:29:56
Speaker
And we have these floats historically known as pageant wagons, which I think is so funny. This, this, I don't know, this idea of a pageant wagon just reminds me of Casey Musgrave's, like, pageant album. And I just picture Casey Musgrave's, like, running around on a pageant wagon. Pageant wagon, like, grab my pageant wagon, bitch, like, I'm ready to go.
00:30:26
Speaker
I would ride around in a patch of wagon. Like get in bitch, we're going to York.
00:30:34
Speaker
So we have this drama or this controversy because there aren't actually a lot of detailed descriptions of these English pageant wagons or the particulars of the staging that these traveling, you know, plays would commence. And so this kind of drama performance or this, you know, acting performance was their primary use. So historians kind of go back and forth on their methodology and their appearance.
00:31:00
Speaker
However, these transportable, like, performance wagon things were also called, quote, cycle or mystery plays being processional in nature, traveling from about 1375 to the mid 16th century in such cities as York, or Chester, as part of the Corpus Christi festival. And no, I do not mean Texas.
00:31:24
Speaker
but it was also common in Spain, Belgium, and the Netherlands. In the United States, parades and parade floats were an important part of American lifestyle starting in the early 1800s. We have a female designer that comes along making a significant change in American parade float designs, and this was Isabella Coleman. She really set an example of what the possibilities of a float can look like and how we can
00:31:54
Speaker
kind of take it to the extreme. And that's really contributed to her work, especially when it comes to the Rose Parade in Pasadena, California. In 1910, she won second prize for her float design with individual flower petals being glued to the float. Then later she pioneered the system in which we place a stem of the flower in a really kind of teeny tiny vial to prolong their lifespan.
00:32:19
Speaker
As float designs became more sophisticated, Coleman wanted a method for the floats to seem like they're moving through air. This required developing a system that hid the carriage of the float from view, essentially. And this came about the steel carriage welded to a truck frame.
00:32:40
Speaker
Within this frame, there was also a hidden cockpit for the driver as well. And she chose small diameters. She chose airplane wheels for the unit as well, as they kind of made the float to appear to hover just above the ground.
00:32:58
Speaker
So Bianca is going to kind of walk us through the commercialism that has appeared, particularly in American culture with the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade when we get into the Thanksgiving of it all. But Coleman was actually the first to pitch the idea that floats could have corporate sponsors, which I thought was really interesting. And she actually went on to build Rose Parade floats for the next 59 years. And her success created a small industry of professional,
00:33:28
Speaker
parade float designers. And she had her own business where she just specifically did this. Today, most major floats are designed and constructed by professional builders. Each float costs between, you know, $30,000 to $200,000 or more. And it takes about a year to create. The floats are built in large warehouses using a wide variety of materials and construction techniques today.
00:33:56
Speaker
So there's a lot to cover. We could get into the specificities of how a float is designed and what that entails, but
00:34:03
Speaker
it has just become such a broad thing cross-culturally that I think you guys kind of get the gist of that. But I wanted to shift from flow iconography and move onto other key aspects of parades from hometowns to large events, which really kind of revolves around the idea of the marching band.
Marching Bands in Parades
00:34:24
Speaker
So the earliest military marching band that historians have documented were from the Ottoman Empire in the 13th century.
00:34:31
Speaker
The Ottomans conquered vast swaths of territory in northern Africa, the Middle East, and southern Europe and brought their marching band tradition with them. The history of marching band uniforms begins with the inclusion of musicians in medieval armies. During the Middle Ages, groups of marching musicians joined their army where their music was used to direct troops on the battlefield and to maintain morale.
00:34:56
Speaker
Like the soldiers in these armies, musicians wore plumes from local birds, specific colors, and distinct motive to show their loyalty to, you know, the Lord, their Lord, whoever, their army. However, full uniforms at this point were uncommon. In the 1700s, military marching bands appeared in revolutionary-era America in the form of fife and drum corps.
00:35:23
Speaker
National armies were also the first to issue completely regulated uniforms for both soldiers and musicians. Thanks in large part to composer and conductor John Philip Sousa, marching band music expanded in terms of repertoire,
00:35:37
Speaker
towards the end of the 1800s, credited for writing the Marine Corps official song as well. When jumping to 1907, we have our first halftime show for football game. So this combination of military, conquering, political history
00:35:54
Speaker
then also gets transformed into sports and competition, which is pretty synonymous with other kind of visual sports history we have talked about on the podcast before, in particular with the Nika riots. So marching and music clearly have this history and it lends itself really well to parades in terms of celebration and spirit and camaraderie.
00:36:17
Speaker
I think the visual effects that come with the idea of the float and also the uniform kind of go hand in hand. There's something very like garish about it, something very specific about it. There's also something kind of wholesome and familiar about a band that we can equate to the holidays or small towns. I think we all get really excited or those of us who still watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade,
00:36:45
Speaker
You know when you see a band from your hometown or from a drum corps that you maybe have participated in in the past like it's really cute and it's exciting and You know, we're we're familiar with that and I can't help but equate it to something like Homecoming especially, you know being from OSU whatever like we pride ourselves on you know having like the biggest kind of homecoming in the US and it's a big deal and people get really involved in it and Stillwater's
00:37:14
Speaker
population quadruples in October and it's super intense. I think when I think about something like sports and homecomings, it's something that is part of our culture so it's hard to ignore but it's also something that I don't particularly
00:37:34
Speaker
participate in now as an adult, but Bianca and I were both in band. We know what it's like to put on a band uniform. And there's also something specific about the way that that music is played and what environment you are listening to that music into. It sounds very different and specific than listening to other forms of ensembles.
00:37:58
Speaker
Yeah, I really love that we're kind of talking about a locale and small-town parade affairs. I think that Homecoming is one that is so distinctive to each town and to kind of each school that you may have participated in.
00:38:18
Speaker
go to or just a place that you live in. I think, you know, Gianna and I, we were in quite a few parades. When we were in high school, we always had to do the Fourth of July parade. And, you know, we were there for Color Guard and Band and things like that.
00:38:32
Speaker
I don't know there again, you hit the nail on the head just there is something so kind of distinctive about your local homecoming parade or you know, your local Fourth of July parade your local Thanksgiving Christmas Day parade Halloween parade, it's kind of funny to to describe it as wholesome when also this kind of
00:38:53
Speaker
processional culture is like derived from warfare as well, which is kind of interesting and also just celebrating like religion and also other culture. So it's kind of weird that it's all kind of spun off in these different ways and we all kind of have our own different memory or relationship with parades.
00:39:16
Speaker
And I think it does go back to that idea of kind of a facade as well. I mean, I think that there's something about that apple pie aesthetic that a parade might bring to a community that kind of covers up a lot of, you know, negative things about a community, about a high school, about a kind of collegiate experience. Like, you know, whenever
00:39:37
Speaker
you participate in something like homecoming, you are supposed to take pride in that institution or that town that you live in. And there are a lot of times where I did not feel any pride towards OSU and I didn't want to participate in homecoming because I was kind of ashamed to be affiliated with that institution.
Parades in Popular Culture
00:39:53
Speaker
And I didn't like that, um, you know, the, you know, rape culture took place in Greek life and I didn't want to support their floats. So I think there was also that kind of facade aspect that a parade
00:40:04
Speaker
covers up and it's celebratory kind of, I don't know, the imposing of a celebratory experience. Yeah. And I think also in just like bringing it back to like small town vibes too, even when I was in high school, I've just never been a raw, raw kind of gal. I've just never been a person who's had a lot of like school spirit or like team spirit. And so participating in these kinds of things like I can get on board with
00:40:33
Speaker
holiday parade, but when it comes to the institutional connection or the team connection, it's just not for me, I suppose. And even being in band, I've just never been a super competitive person, and I just didn't understand what the big deal was, actually.
00:40:57
Speaker
So kind of moving on a little bit more into parades with other pop culture spaces, I just kind of thought it would be fun to ask you Bianca and just have a candid conversation about what stands out to you parade and pop culture wise. Is there anything else that you think of that has significance like outside of homecoming, outside of just band?
00:41:24
Speaker
I don't know. I'm sure that there's a lot I can think of. You have a lot listed here, so I don't want to say any of the ones that you have listed. I'll say that one of them maybe that I was thinking about that I told you about was Disney World. And I really didn't know this until I actually went that whenever you go, Disney has a parade every single day.
00:41:45
Speaker
whenever we were planning the trip I was like okay like you know my friend really wants to go to the parade like I was kind of skeptical about it I'm not sure why but I just thought parade like sounded kind of hokey but it was like the coolest part of the day like this Disney World parade was so cool and I'm so glad we went and all the characters are so cute and the floats were so cool and I don't know it was so fun but at first I was like a parade I was like why but it was awesome yeah I really liked that so
00:42:15
Speaker
And maybe I'll let you talk about some of the other examples that you have. But that's definitely one that I was at first, you know, I didn't even know it was a thing. But, you know, they showed me it was great. Yeah. And I feel like the Disney adults in particular have like a super like hardcore ownership over the Disney parades as well. Disneyland opened in 1955 and they've had a parade ever since at the park. So it is a super big part of
00:42:42
Speaker
Disney culture, that theme park culture.
00:42:46
Speaker
So we also have the iconic Ferris Bueller's Day off with the Steuben Parade, which is part of the annual three-day German-American festival, now on its 100th year anniversary, I believe. Von Steuben Day is, again, a German-American holiday honoring Baron Frederick von Steuben. Von Steuben was a Prussian general who lent his aid to George Washington during the Revolutionary War, training American troops to help them
00:43:15
Speaker
defeat the British. And Chicago's parade is one of three stupid parades held across the US and it really gained a lot of national attention after this iconic film, Ferris Bueller's Day Off in 1986. Another one that I was thinking about, which, you know, the goths and the emos get triggered by the first note of the song, which I do as well. But my chemical romance, Welcome to the Black Parade,
00:43:43
Speaker
The Black Parade is a rock opera centering around the character of the patient. It is about his passage out of life and the memories he has of it. So the patient dies and death welcomes him in the form of a parade.
00:44:01
Speaker
Another kind of musical performance too, I was thinking about Beyonce Homecoming, even though maybe that wasn't attributed to so much of the parade aspect, the performative aspect of that album. Homecoming was super iconic as well. So I feel like you can't ignore that. And then we have carnivals, which are tied to the celebration before fasting. And I thought this was also a good tie into our episode for next week when we talk about feasting.
00:44:30
Speaker
So we have Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, and that's a festival held every year before lint. And it's considered the biggest carnival in the world with 2 million people per day on the streets. And the first carnival festival in Rio occurred in 1723, so it has a super long history. And then we also have Mardi Gras, which is a big one, also known as Fat Tuesday, also taking place in a variety of different cultures and a variety of different countries.
00:44:58
Speaker
And this is also taking place and culminating before Ash Wednesday, also equating to fasting just in kind of a different religion, but same concept. So yeah, so those were kind of some of my bigger ones. We have some pop culture.
00:45:20
Speaker
carnival or parading events that are really big and then of course the musicality of it all and then you know some of those like pop culture movie moments.
Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade History
00:45:30
Speaker
Alright everyone so with that I think it's time to take a little break and when we come back we'll be talking about the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
00:46:06
Speaker
Welcome back, everybody. Now we are going to talk about the big one, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. So Gianna, do you want to talk a little bit about kind of like your earliest memories of the parade or what you associate the parade with today? For me,
00:46:25
Speaker
as we just kind of talked about, like we are a family that can only be ready for Christmas at a certain time. Like when it's fall, like it is fall, I would like it to be fall. I don't want it to be Christmas yet. So for us, the marker of the Christmas season is when Santa comes out at the end of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. And I think that is,
00:46:52
Speaker
also definitely attributed to mom like the way that I think about it is because of mom for sure like when Santa comes out like fine we can start going to the Christmas tree farm thinking about Christmas pulling out the decorations but until I see freaking Santa it's not time yet so it really Thanksgiving is this good kind of transition holiday and I suppose maybe that's how I view it
00:47:19
Speaker
Yeah, I think that we've always really enjoyed Thanksgiving. And I do equate the same thing. It's like, I can hear mom, you know, being like, all right, let's put the Christmas season on you know, as soon as Santa crosses the finish and you know, we're all kind of sitting around the living room like clapping, you know, for Santa. And yeah, I just it is such a marker in our household that
00:47:41
Speaker
the holiday season really is upon us and it just for us it really kick-started like the rest of our family traditions.
00:47:49
Speaker
put the decorations up, we could go pick out the treat, you know, like something about Santa on our screen just really means something to us. And it's like, I can't deal with this, like, oh, you know, freaking Mariah Carey on the morning after Halloween announcing it's a holiday season. It's just, it's obviously, you know, people can sell it. There's something wrong with celebrating a little earlier, things like that. But I think it's just for us,
00:48:19
Speaker
I don't know, that's kind of our family tradition, I suppose. So we're big Macy's parade people over here. I can almost like smell, you know, dad cooking breakfast. Like, of course we had to have like a big breakfast before we had Thanksgiving dinner too. So I can like smell, you know, like potatoes and pancakes, like being
00:48:41
Speaker
Made while you know, we watch the parade. There's such a kind of like sensory experience as well for us At least where we're watching the parade and kind of like meal prepping for the day And it is that kind of like immersive. I don't know tradition Yeah, and then I can put on a Christmas movie and then I'm like, okay. No wait, like I'm in the mood for this. Yes. Yeah, totally. Yeah
00:49:07
Speaker
So I want to talk about the parade's history a little bit. Macy's first staged this parade in 1924, but it was originally called the Macy's Christmas Parade. It followed the route between 145th Street and Convent Avenue to the Macy's store at 34th Street and Broadway. Three floats that were originally pulled by horses
00:49:32
Speaker
took place in the parade. There were four bands and zoo animals from the Central Park Zoo. They had camels, donkeys, elephants, and goats. And these were features of the parade. Santa Claus was last in the lineup, which is obviously a tradition that still continues to this day, which at the time unveiled Macy's Christmas window display as well.
00:49:57
Speaker
Three years after its inception, the Christmas Parade was renamed the Thanksgiving Day Parade. Macy's didn't invent this practice. Obviously, Philadelphia actually had the oldest Thanksgiving Day Parade. It's Gimbal's Thanksgiving Day Parade, which is now the ABC Dunkin' Donuts Thanksgiving Day Parade, actually debuted in 1920.
00:50:21
Speaker
So obviously starting in 1924, the parade was kind of centered in this phase of the Roaring Twenties, which was obviously a time of prosperity in the US, which gave the parade this tie back to consumer culture, which of course we love to see here in the US and we'll talk about here in a minute. In 1927, the giant balloons that we know today had replaced the live zoo animals.
00:50:48
Speaker
At the conclusion of the parade, these giant balloons were originally released into the air. And Gianna and I are looking at a picture of the balloons right now. And like, honestly, this fish balloon is terrifying. If I was a kid, I would not want to go to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. I do not like it. I also have I told you guys that I just don't trust fish. Like I don't like it. Breathe underwater. It's weird. I don't.
00:51:16
Speaker
I don't like it. So why does it have teeth? And this is like the scariest fish I've ever seen. Truly. There's also like a funky looking like horse in the background. I just like honestly, these balloons have come such a long way. They're really low to the ground also. I mean, I think their scale has something to do with that as well. Like now they are just like
00:51:38
Speaker
Enormous balloons and you know, you're always like here at Al Roker Tung about like how many gallons of you know, whatever it is So funny that that is such a part of the commentary like this balloon took this many people to make it has this many gallons of Oxygen in it and it has this many people holding it up
00:51:59
Speaker
right i know i know um so again these balloons were originally like released just straight into the air um and i think this um this had to do with the helium as well that was in them so oxygen
00:52:14
Speaker
Well, I was reading something about like, in particular, like the helium allowed for the I'm not sure what they used if it's helium that they use today for the entire massive balloon. I don't know. I'm not a chemist. We're not gas experts here. I don't fucking know.
00:52:31
Speaker
So in 1928 Macy's actually began offering $100 rewards for any of the balloons that could be returned like I don't know why they wanted to return them after they just like release them into the air but whatever. So why are they releasing them? I just I don't know.
00:52:46
Speaker
on the balloon they actually had return addresses like labeled on the balloon so people could turn them in and then in 1931 there was a pilot Colonel Clarence E Chamberlain who snagged a balloon using an airplane and then this led to a ban on retrieval by airplanes the following year so then after that after the ban in 1932 another pilot attempted to capture a balloon
00:53:15
Speaker
Um, and it nearly crashed actually. So then Macy's discontinued releasing the balloons at the end of the parade. I guess it was like maybe a spectacle for the city, like underdog gets away, you know, type of thing. So in 1934, we begin to see the involvement of celebrities in the parade actually with singer and actor Eddie Cantor joining the event. So.
00:53:38
Speaker
From 1942 to 1944, the parade was canceled because of the shortage of helium and rubber during World War II. So I thought that was interesting. It wasn't necessarily canceled out of morale, but out of kind of supply shortage. And those are the only years that the celebration had been canceled.
Consumerism and Holiday Traditions
00:54:03
Speaker
When the parade returned in 1946, it was broadcast on television for the first time and it had previously been broadcast via radio. So you could kind of listen to the commentary over the radio as well before that.
00:54:18
Speaker
This year, we will be celebrating the 95th anniversary of the parade on Thanksgiving Day. So to wrap things up for this episode, Gianna, I just wanted to talk with you about what the Thanksgiving Day parade kind of means for our consumer culture these days. And I think, you know, again, how it used to be the Christmas Day parade for Macy's, at least, I wonder,
00:54:41
Speaker
What that meant for gimbals in Philadelphia, who is originally doing the Thanksgiving Day parade. Like this is just such an intense marketing strategy I feel for me. And I feel like now, you know, I hate this idea of like early Black Friday. Like it's not early Black Friday. You're just, it's just shopping on Thanksgiving or whatever. But I think that like our consumer
00:55:02
Speaker
culture is jump-started by the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade as well. And honestly like there are sponsorships, the McDonald's balloons or the you know different kind of like floats with celebrities kind of sponsoring their own thing or you know a new Christmas album or something like that. So there is something to be said about the marketing behind the parade even though we kind of continue to love it. So I was wondering
00:55:28
Speaker
or wanting to hear your thoughts about that. Yeah, I think you're exactly right. I think it does jumpstart the consumer culture of the holiday season. I think that's a huge part of it. But that's also part of the reason why I think I have this strict date about when I want to participate in things. Because I don't want to be a part of that. We constantly have to buy, buy, buy so early. And we have to prep for it this early. I'm very aware of that.
00:55:56
Speaker
Black Friday really isn't something that I participate in that much anymore. I do some like cyber Monday stuff. I think maybe we went the Thanksgiving before you moved the last Thanksgiving I spent with you like what like two and a half years ago or something. So yeah, but I think especially with the balloons is where we get a lot of our consumer culture, I think with the
00:56:27
Speaker
floats you get more like celebrity promotion um but also like there's something wholesome about it like i don't want the sesame street float to go away even though it's promoting sesame street you know what i mean it is part of our pop culture that
00:56:41
Speaker
releasing your next Christmas album or like the Rockettes, any of that. I don't want that to go away, but like the Tony the Tiger, like whoo, big float. I don't necessarily need. And that's for me, I guess, why or sorry, balloon. I've never been a big like balloon kind of gal because I feel like it's more just like commercializing super like these super big.
00:57:06
Speaker
like corporations corporations are also they're like caricatures like Tony the Tiger or like the bee from like Honey Nut Cheerios oh yeah that's always funny to me and even Ronald McDonald I know there's like the Ronald McDonald house and I'm like okay like whatever I can make my piece with the big clown but I just I
00:57:27
Speaker
that has never been like a super kind of fun part for me as the balloons. Yeah, and it's also going back to like the commentary of the anchors like
00:57:36
Speaker
It's just so odd that the anchors have to like put on this facade about like, here comes Tony the tiger. Like frosted flakes are a delicious product of a nutrition. It's just like, honey, that sure isn't going to give you cancer, folks. We put chemicals in our oats, you know? Yeah, like you like Roundup? Yeah, it's weird that, um, that the floats are described like on a technical level, but also like behind that there's this like,
00:58:05
Speaker
Sponsorship that the anchors have to like play along with especially for kids watching the parade, you know, it's like all cheery and stuff like that. Yeah We're just getting commercial I think one of my favorite parts about the about the parade are, you know, definitely celebrity appearances and so the Broadway yes Broadway little shows but that's so funny because with the
00:58:30
Speaker
You know, we talked about how you could listen to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day per on the radio, but now that it's broadcasted, we can have these different performances. And I think obviously is in New York too. So it's a celebration of that city life too, and that city culture and the arts there. And so yeah, I think I really like
00:58:48
Speaker
you know, the ruckettes and the little Broadway performances too, which will honestly be really nice to see hopefully this year with now that Broadway is back up and running. I think that'll be such a... I know Moulin Rouge will be there. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's great. I'm like, I think that is some like nice wholesome like cheer that like we all need. I will say the funniest thing to me about the parades is how the singers like lip sing.
00:59:15
Speaker
And it's this thing that we all just accept. We just accept. There's something about the microphones that they hold for the parades. They're like really big. And they have their little like, like we have them on our mics now, these little like foam caps on them, but they're really like
00:59:34
Speaker
floofy and they always have their like gloves on and they're in their red coat like their winter aesthetic. And so like this massive glove and this massive microphone that doesn't do anything. It just is so funny.
00:59:50
Speaker
It is really funny. Yeah, I wonder, I don't know. I wonder if that's always been a thing, the lip syncing aspect, or if it's, I don't know, because like, I remember when I came to that realization that they were lip syncing, it blew my mind. I was like, what? I was like, I was offended. I was like, so, so when I finally found that out. I mean, how would that work? I'm not saying that hypothetically, like there wouldn't be a way to like hook up each float with its own sound system. But to broadcast that and to make it audible for people actually
01:00:20
Speaker
Physically there. Yeah, I mean control the like temperature the wind. I don't know what that looks like with I think there's also so There's so many electronical components to floats these days. Yeah, I mean, I'm just thinking of like the fire hazard of it all but yeah, I don't know I think also at the same time the lip singing is a part of this kind of cheeky and
01:00:41
Speaker
nature to the parade and I think that's why we just accept it, but it would be extremely difficult. We're asking for a lot from these people, you know what I mean? We are and I'm sure that it's like not great to like put out your best vocals and sometimes like the freezing cold or you know, yeah, that can't be like the best thing. Well, I feel like we done did it.
01:01:03
Speaker
Does this get us in the holiday spirit a little bit? Is APT your new marker of the holiday season? I'm getting really excited for Thanksgiving now. I really want some pigs in a blanket. You can make them anytime you want.
01:01:19
Speaker
I know, but they're like a Thanksgiving. Well, let us know your hot takes on some pigs in a blanket. You know, drop it in our... What other weird food do you put on your table for Thanksgiving? That's what I want to know.
01:01:34
Speaker
Okay, we'll do a little poll. Yeah, yeah, that could be fun. So everyone, for next week, we are going to keep up with the holiday spirit. Like I said earlier, we will be talking about feasting. So good idea with a food poll there, that'll get us in a good mood for next week. So stay tuned for that.
01:01:52
Speaker
Make sure that you're keeping up with us on social platforms and sign up for our newsletter if you haven't done so already because we like to lay out the months episode for you guys as well. If you have any thoughts or notions, you can email us at artpoptalk at gmail.com.
01:02:09
Speaker
And with that, we will talk to you all next Tuesday. Bye, everyone. Bye. Art Pop Talk's executive producers are me, Bianca Martucci Fink. And me, Gianna Martucci Fink. Music and sounds are by Josh Turner and photography is by Adrian Turner. And our graphic designer is Sid Hammond.
01:02:45
Speaker
you