| Summary: | This analysis explores the history of Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee through an investigation of three objects: James McNeill Whistler’s print Tilbury (1887), a photograph taken aboard the HMY Victoria and Albert during the Naval Review, and a Royal Worcester commemorative scent bottle. Drawing from methodologies developed in the fields of material culture studies, histories of empire, and the environmental humanities, the study traces the maritime itineraries made visible during the Jubilee. For Whistler, the Jubilee provided an opportunity to leverage Britain’s imperial character in a way that would bolster his own artistic ambitions as president of the Society of British Artists. In Tilbury, he renders the newly inaugurated docks through a series of etched lines that convey the frenetic level of activity on the riverbank, and point to the environmental impact of this infrastructure project. In the photograph from the Naval Review, two Indian men who had recently joined the royal household mingle with the Queen’s guests and companions. Identified as Abdul Karim and Muhammad Bakhsh, their presence signals the widespread visibility of Indian visitors and servants throughout the Jubilee, which occurred only a year after the Indian and Colonial Exhibition. The Queen’s global reign is also celebrated in the Royal Worcester souvenir scent bottle, composed of materials mined locally in Britain and imported from South America and other regions. Collectively, these object studies delineate specific ways in which the Jubilee centered the Thames as a portal for the transit and display of colonized peoples and imperial goods, and expand art-historical approaches to the interconnected relationships foregrounded by the environmental and global humanities.
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