Golden Toilet ‘America’ at Auction
Our toilets have never sat quite so proudly on the pedestal of art history—until now. The tongue-in-cheek masterwork America, a fully functional 18-karat solid gold toilet by Italian provocateur Maurizio Cattelan, is set for its grand flush into the art market, making its auction debut at Sotheby’s in New York.
The Throne of Modern Art
Created in 2016, America weighs roughly 101 kg (223 lb) of gold and was first installed at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, where museum-goers queued—quite literally—to use it. In its gleaming form, the work turns the banal act of using a lavatory into a spectacle of value, consumption, and self-reflection. Its polished surface invited both selfies and sociological commentary, gleaming like Versailles plumbing for the people.
The Guggenheim famously offered to loan the White House Cattelan’s solid-gold toilet — America — after Trump officials had requested a Van Gogh painting. The piece, which had been part of a public exhibition allowing visitors to actually use it, was proposed as a tongue-in-cheek alternative to the Dutch master’s work. The White House did not officially respond to the offer.
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From Museum Flush to Auction Rush
Sotheby’s will offer America in its Now & Contemporary Evening Auction on 18 November 2025, with bidding expected to start around US $10 million, reflecting the gold’s intrinsic value alone. In typical Cattelan style, it’s a parody wrapped in perfection—a critique of excess that doubles as excess itself.
Rather than flushing away meaning, the artist has piped it straight into the art market. In this case, bidders will not only buy a conversation piece but also an investment—an ironic blend of bullion and bathroom.
It’s hard to miss the symbolism: a toilet made of solid gold, titled America, was always meant to be more mirror than joke. Cattelan’s gleaming bowl reflects a nation that worships wealth while flushing empathy, where luxury is measured not in comfort but in karats.
In a country where billionaires build rockets while hospitals beg for funding, America is both monument and mockery — a portrait of a culture that gilds everything, even the place where it all goes down the drain.
America takes the spirit of Duchamp’s Fountain and flips it. Where Duchamp presented a cheap urinal as art, Cattelan forged a toilet in pure gold and invited public participation. It collapses the boundary between the sacred and the profane, between the throne room and the restroom.
Installed at Blenheim Palace in 2019, the golden toilet was famously stolen overnight—plumbing ripped apart, palace flooded, thieves vanished. The work was never recovered, adding an extra layer of myth to an already outrageous object.
As Cattelan quipped, “Whatever you eat—a $200 lunch or a $2 hot dog—the results are the same, toilet-wise.” That punchline has never seemed more flush with truth.
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Cattelan’s Greatest Hits
Maurizio Cattelan is one of contemporary art’s great pranksters — the art world’s premier enfant terrible, part philosopher, part jester, and fully committed to making the art world look at itself in the mirror (often while blushing). Here’s a rundown of his best-known works and the gleeful chaos they’ve caused:
The Pope and the Meteorite — La Nona Ora (The Ninth Hour), 1999
Arguably his most infamous work, it shows a wax figure of Pope John Paul II struck down by a meteorite, still clutching his cross as he lies sprawled on a red carpet. Exhibited at the Venice Biennale, it sparked outrage from religious groups and delight from critics who saw it as a meditation on faith, mortality, and the fallibility of power at a time that the Roman Catholic Church was dealing with their clerical kiddie fiddler issues.
Maurizio Cattelan’s La Nona Ora sold for USD$ 886,000 in 2001.
Him (2001) Maurizio Cattelan
A life-sized wax sculpture of Adolf Hitler kneeling in prayer, viewed from behind, looks almost childlike until you circle around and see the face. Installed in a former Warsaw ghetto, the piece forced viewers to wrestle with questions of forgiveness, horror, and complicity.
Him by Maurizio Cattelan, depicting Adolf Hitler kneeling in prayer, exhibited in a courtyard in the former Warsaw Ghetto, 2013. Maciej Szczepańczyk, Wikimedia Commons
When Christie’s auctioned the artist’s proof from an edition of three plus one artist’s proof in 2016, it sold for nearly $17 million, proving discomfort sells.
“I’m not trying to offend anyone. I don’t want to raise a new conflict or create some publicity; I would just like that image to become a territory for negotiation or a test for our psychoses,” Maurizio Cattelan said.
The Suicidal Squirrel — Bidibidobidiboo, 1996
A tragicomic scene of a taxidermy squirrel slumped over a miniature kitchen table with a pistol nearby. The title is a gibberish Cinderella incantation — his dark humor about domestic despair and the absurdity of existence. It’s both slapstick and heartbreak in one tableau.
The Hanging Horse — Novecento, 1997
A real, taxidermied horse suspended from the ceiling by its harness — head down, legs dangling — suggesting the weight of history and futility of progress. It’s an image both grotesque and graceful, a running joke stopped mid-stride.
The Comedic Thief — Another Fucking Readymade, 1996
Cattelan once stole another artist’s work from a gallery, re-titled it, and exhibited it as his own. The stunt was both a parody of Duchamp and a jab at the art world’s hypocrisy. He later said he did it because he’d run out of ideas — which, of course, was the idea.
“Maurizio Cattelan is an inveterate sinner. He has no scruples about coveting his neighbour’s house or stealing his possessions.” – Francesco Bonami, Nancy Spector & Barbara Vanderlinden, Maurizio Cattelan, London 2003)
Himself Hanging — Untitled (Hanging Cattelan), 2004
Three child-sized mannequins of boys hanging from a tree, installed in Milan, one of which was meant to represent the artist. Locals tried to cut them down, and the piece provoked debates about childhood, innocence, and public art’s right to shock.
The All-Too-Real Effigy — Maurizio Cattelan Is Dead, 2000
A wax self-portrait of the artist emerging from a hole in the gallery floor, appearing to crawl out like a guilty conscience. He later “retired” from art in 2011 with a full retrospective at the Guggenheim, then “unretired” because, of course, that was the joke.
The Banana — Comedian, 2019
Ah yes, the banana duct-taped to a wall that sold for $120,000 at Art Basel Miami Beach. Equal parts prank and provocation, it made headlines around the world.
When another artist ate it, Cattelan simply replaced it with a new banana — proving that in conceptual art, potassium never spoils.
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The Great Golden Toilet Heist
If ever there was a crime that gleamed with absurdity, it was the 2019 theft of Maurizio Cattelan’s America — the world’s only fully functional 18-karat gold toilet.
Installed at England’s Blenheim Palace, birthplace of Winston Churchill, the artwork was part of a retrospective titled Victory is Not an Option. It was open to the public and plumbed into the palace’s existing system, allowing visitors to do their business — quite literally — on a fortune.
Then, in the early hours of September 14, 2019, a gang of thieves made their move. Police believe they broke in around 4:50 a.m., unbolted the golden commode from its fittings, and vanished into the night — triggering chaos and an almighty flood.
Since America was fully connected to Blenheim’s plumbing, the removal left pipes gushing water through the stately home. The palace was forced to close temporarily as investigators sifted through the soggy evidence of one of Britain’s strangest art crimes.
Authorities arrested several suspects but never recovered the artwork. With a value estimated between US $5 million and $6 million, some speculated the thieves melted it down for gold, while others suggested it had been spirited away intact — perhaps still sitting, somewhere, in secret.
Cattelan himself, ever the trickster, initially quipped that the theft might be “the perfect inside job.” Later he clarified he wasn’t involved — “I wish I had,” he joked.
The heist cemented America’s legend. A satire on wealth, power, and privilege had become a real-life parable of greed and folly. The irony was flush: a work mocking excess was literally stolen for its material value.
The world’s most valuable toilet had disappeared, leaving behind a crime scene, a flooded palace, and the nagging question — who’s sitting on America now?
Sotheby’s offer America in its Now & Contemporary Evening Auction on 18 November 2025, with bidding expected to start around US $10 million.
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