There's No Accounting, Or Taste

Summary

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The Dream – “There’s No Accounting, Or Taste”

Host: Jane Marie
Guest: Seema Rao (Art historian, museum educator, and founder of Artlust on Substack, TikTok, Instagram)
Release Date: July 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode marks the return of "The Dream" in a new weekly interview format. Jane Marie and art historian Seema Rao take a deep dive into the spectacular failure of the recent "Freedom 250" fair, meant to commemorate America’s 250th birthday. They use the flop as a lens for discussing the politics of taste, American identity, institutional knowledge, and why so many large national projects go awry—especially in a Trump-influenced era. With a focus on design, intention, and who events are "for," Jane and Seema also explore broader themes of who gets to define the American Dream and why so many efforts feel out of touch with everyday people.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. What Happened at the “Freedom 250” Fair?

• Jane observes the shockingly weak celebration of America’s 250th ("Freedom 250"), recalling the abundant memorabilia from the 200th.
• Seema, who analyzed the fair as an art and experience critic, describes being personally let down due to her background in museum work and prior excitement over potential community engagement.
  • Plans for "America 250" were originally bottom-up: each state and county could make it local, such as affordable art prints by local artists, funded by federal money (04:21).
  • The event was privatized and consolidated into the "Freedom 250" LLC, stripping away public engagement.

"What I really wanted was… working with Ohio artists to be able to create an edition of affordable prints you could get from your county… taking federal money, putting it in the hands of artists." – Seema Rao (04:26)

2. The Flop: Design, Taste, and Meaning

• Both Jane and Seema dissect the failed aesthetics and shoddy execution at the fair:
  • The "Trump Arch" is a centerpiece, intended as a symbol of power, but is poorly constructed—plywood covered with printed vinyl, with faux-gold eagles and an awkward winged Lady Liberty.
    • Seema explains its historical roots as a temporary Roman triumphal arch but interprets it as "imperial cult" symbolism, now rendered as “dictator decor.” (07:32–13:33)
  • The displays and booths were mostly 2D, flat, and lifeless, feeling cheap and uninspired (12:13).
  • State exhibits were just signage, with the only activity for children being coloring sheets—described as "the least interesting" possible activity (25:24).

"It's basically made out of plywood... covered in this printed, like, looks like vinyl... only the corners have any kind of detailing, but that's done very shoddily." – Seema Rao (12:13)

“Nothing says Liberty like useless waste of money.” – Seema Rao (13:49)

3. Why Did the Fair Feel So Soulless?

• Jane and Seema explore structural, philosophical, and personal failures:
  • Lack of institutional structure or experienced staff, compounded by Trump firing knowledgeable people, left the event with no organizational backbone (18:42–21:27).
  • Cronyism and alleged self-dealing meant little motivation to please or engage the public (22:15).
  • Experience design failed because, as Seema puts it, “You cannot make anything for someone if you don’t like them.” Those in charge lacked respect or understanding for the audience (22:15–24:50).

“You cannot make anything for someone if you don’t like them.” – Seema Rao (22:15)

4. How Events Could Have Been Done Right

• Seema shares examples and alternatives:
  • Recounts museum events shaped by love of community and meaningful interaction (21:28–24:50).
  • Cites interactive museum exhibits—like a Titanic pop-up where attendees get identity cards and discover their fate at the end—as powerful but simple strategies, lacking in Freedom 250 (27:32).
  • Suggests the fair could have highlighted the diverse regional cultures in interactive, meaningful ways—rather than reducing everything to flat images and generic cars.

5. Presidential Taste, Class, and Legacy

• The hosts zoom out to discuss taste in leadership:
  • Seema recalls how prior big national events, like the 200th, succeeded because they were decentralized (local libraries, nonprofits, etc, did their own thing) (29:41).
  • Trump’s aesthetic is read as "new money" ostentation—spray-painted polyurethanes from Home Depot, believing gold equals power (32:46).
  • Clinton and Ford’s approaches are discussed as less personal—and thus more effective for the nation.
  • Taste, they agree, is inherently personal, but when presidents impose their personal vision too strongly (i.e., “dictator decor”), it backfires.

"Dictator decor…I think when you make something and you don’t care about the person who it’s for, you don’t care how it’s perceived." – Seema Rao (33:21)

“Trump doesn't know he can't be their class. So he… thinks that he is defining old, old money, but he can't because he can't see it.” – Seema Rao (36:27)

“He really believes that this is his destiny… He acts like someone who knows he shouldn't be there and he's getting away with it.” – Jane Marie & Seema Rao (36:41–37:31)

6. Insecurity, Superlatives, and the Politics of Self-Presentation

• Jane analyzes Trump's relentless use of superlatives as a marker of insecurity.
• Seema compares it to students who lack competence but use hyperbole, contrasting with the humility and nuance from those who actually do hard work (39:00).

“He speaks about, you know, whenever he talks. It's the greatest. This. It's the best. Whatever. I've done more than this person. I've done more….that habit of speaking that way is, like, so sad and insecure.” – Jane Marie (38:13)

7. Museum Wisdom: Comfort, Space, and Creating Meaning

• Seema draws from her museum background to discuss intentional comfort and meaning in exhibits, even down to subtleties like the use of white space, seating, and emotional flow (41:33–44:29).
• Recounts her own journey into museum work—from art history in high school, considering medical illustration, and discovering a love for dialog and audience engagement.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Trump’s Taste and Power:
  “Dictator decor…I think when you make something and you don’t care about the person who it’s for, you don’t care how it’s perceived.” – Seema Rao (33:21)
• On the Failure of the 250th Fair:
  “Nothing says Liberty like useless waste of money.” – Seema Rao (13:49)
• On Community and Event Design:
  “You cannot make anything for someone if you don’t like them.” – Seema Rao (22:15)
• On Insecurity and Superlatives:
  “He speaks about, you know, whenever he talks. It’s the greatest. This. It’s the best. That habit of speaking that way is, like, so sad and insecure.” – Jane Marie (38:13)
• On Class and Legacy:
  “Trump doesn't know he can't be their class. So he… thinks that he is defining old, old money, but he can't because he can't see it.” – Seema Rao (36:27)

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Key Timestamps

• [01:01] – Recalling the flop of Freedom 250 and discussion of past successful celebrations
• [04:21] – Seema details original grassroots plans for America 250 vs. what happened
• [07:32] – History and symbolism of arches; Trump’s failed reinterpretation
• [12:13] – Detailed critique of the “Trump Arch” and exhibit design failures
• [18:42] – Analysis of event operations and the consequences of firing institutional staff
• [22:15] – The necessity of caring about your audience for successful experience design
• [25:24] – The fatal mistake: treating families and children with condescension at events
• [29:41] – Presidential taste, old money vs. new money, and decentralizing celebrations
• [33:21] – “Dictator decor” and why personal taste at scale always misses the mark
• [36:41] – Trump as "pretender to the throne" and insecurity about class standing
• [38:13] – The politics of language, self-presentation, and insecurity
• [41:33] – Museum design principles; creating spaces that comfort and educate
• [44:32] – Seema’s journey into museum work and the ethos of audience-focused curation

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Tone and Style Highlights

• The conversation is frank, witty, and analytical, with doses of biting humor balanced by professional insight, especially when examining art, power, and public events.
• Seema’s deep knowledge of museum culture pairs with Jane’s direct, skeptical questioning to make complex cultural criticism both accessible and engaging.
• Both speakers draw connections between aesthetics, politics, and the deeper question: who is the American Dream for, and who gets to shape its public expression?

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This episode offers a sharp, layered critique of the intersection between institutional knowledge, political spectacle, and taste, with a specific (and humorous) lens on how—and why—a major American celebration failed to connect.

Transcript

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[Jane Marie]

I'm Jane Marie and this is the Dream do you remember how sad the Great American State Fair seemed earlier this month? It was so bad, your answer might be nope, didn't notice. It was supposed to be a huge celebration of our country's founding 250 years ago, but it pretty much flopped. I wanted to know why. I wasn't alive for the 200th, but I was born a few years later and remember seeing lots of ephemera from it, T shirts and buttons and special collector's items. But now, just a few weeks out from this fourth of July, it's like nothing even happened. Why was it so bad?

[Seema Rao]

My name is Seema Rao and I run artlust on all sorts of platforms including Substack and TikTok and Instagram. I came from 20 some years of museum work and I got burned out and so then I left to do this on my own.

[Jane Marie]

What was your museum work?

[Seema Rao]

So I worked at the Cleveland Museum of Art, but I did what's called interpretation and we help make sure that galleries and exhibitions are more understandable to more people. So I'm an art historian and it's very different in each kind of museum. So what we usually do is we work with all of the teams, curatorial, curatorials. The role I think people don't understand about museums is they're really research institutions, not spaces that art is shown. The showing of art is the end product, but they do all this research and so they're spending a lot of time like, like an exhibition I worked on. One of my favorites. I shouldn't say one of my favorites. I love them all. But it was about the idea that Pompeii exploded and then it was found and then it kept getting reconsidered by generation after generation of culture. That's a very complex idea. Right. Another show that I've worked on is like a retrospective of Picasso. The. That is so easy that there's not. You know, that's pretty easy. Like we used to joke. This is the only thing we had to explain for the retrospective of Picasso is who he was sleeping with in that room, you know.

[Jane Marie]

Well, I follow your work.

[Seema Rao]

Thank you.

[Jane Marie]

And I really loved your analysis of the America's Fair. I don't know what it was called.

[Seema Rao]

The Freedom 250.

[Jane Marie]

I think Freedom 250, by the way, is a shell company.

[Seema Rao]

Oh, I know.

[Jane Marie]

It was supposed to be.

[Seema Rao]

It's an llc.

[Jane Marie]

Yeah. And registered in Delaware. And it was supposed to be America 250, which was like a government run program. But I was watching your analysis of the art there and I, I just wanted to. Can we just start with your understanding of.

[Seema Rao]

Yeah.

[Jane Marie]

This fair, this failed fair.

[Seema Rao]

I have to say it's. I feel very personal about it. I feel.

[Jane Marie]

Oh, really?

[Seema Rao]

Yeah. Because one of the things that made me so angry is I was still in museums in 2014. The Smithsonian was talking about America 250. And one of the things that they wanted. And so Ohio has, and Michigan has more, but they have a certain percentage of rural patrons. And so what was planned for America 250 is that people could have like, like you could have had maybe in rural Ohio, a bookmobile. I mean, I'm making this one up, but a bookmobile with only books about the great times in America. Right, right. Like you could have had that. The. What I really wanted was we were talking about it. I was still on Ohio Museum association board working with Ohio artists to be able to create like an edition of affordable prints you could get from your account. Like there's, you know, there's artists in every county. So basically taking federal money, putting in the hands of artists and then getting people to get to have like a $20 print for America 250. And you know, there was all of these kinds of things. And they were, I mean, I remember sitting on like a big call. It must, I mean, you know, they were, they were, they were pushing so hard from the national federal organizations. They were like, you know, like this is gonna be great and here's how you do it and here's some idea. Like they were, they were basically working as hard as they could to make it be local and then also national and at the national level. So because there's so many arms to it, nobody is in charge of any part of it, which is ideal because then nobody can sink it.

[Jane Marie]

Oh, I see. So that's not a deficit.

[Seema Rao]

Exactly. He just cut everything and he sunk it. But in an ideal situation, nobody does. So even if you're like, because, you know, if you think about like we always talk about like, community theater is my example. You know how community theater can be great if you have a good person or it can go awry. But luckily there's another community right next door. So the idea of big, like, big events, Cleveland 200 or the hundredth anniversary of a museum or whatever those kinds of things are, they usually spread it out amongst different constituent groups. So at least some of it is fun. So he basically took everything out of it, but then he added things that really wouldn't have been part of it. And so the biggest example of that to me is his, the Trump arch, as he calls it. You know, I, I, that's, that happens to be. Because I think it's a great symbol of everything he's done wrong. So the, historically those kinds of arches came from the, actually from the Roman Republic before the imperial thing. They were very, very temporary and you had to win and the person who won had to erect it.

[Jane Marie]

Wait, what do you mean?

[Seema Rao]

So like in the Roman Republic before, you know, when they were still electing people, democracy, you are a general who wins a battle, you then feel so excited about it, you have to ask senate, can I have a triumphal arch to celebrate the victory of my men? And then they have to agree and then you have to pay for it.

[Jane Marie]

You as the one who won the thing.

[Seema Rao]

Yeah, okay. If you want that accolade, you gotta pay for it. And it used to be like something you would ride under. So if you were coming into town, you would see that they just won this battle. So what happens is, so that's the beginning is democracy. Then the Roman emperors, they still actually have to win things, but they don't have to pay for it, the state pays for it and it becomes an imperial symbol that is also not temporary. It becomes something that is a stand in for their power. So the Roman emperors want basically become cult figures. So they're like semi divine and they're not like, you know, Zeus, but they Weren't. They are not like regular people. And so you have things like there's actually been a whole spate of these. These imperial figures that were all found in a cult temple, imperial cult temple in Turkey that have recently been, over the last few years, returned to Turkey because they were stolen. So it's really easy to find pictures of them right now because they're in the news. But basically, as part of that kind of culture, they also erect these arches. And I think about this. You think about how many places have the ruler on the coinage or on the money? We do, right? We have our, you know, ex presidents, our founding fathers and our money. It's the same kind of thing. It's this idea that many nations or many, you know, states of, however they're governed, need to have a visual symbol that reminds you of order. Because, like, I don't. And I think. I think of my regular day. I don't. I work from home. I don't go a lot of places. But even if I drive just to the grocery store, it's not like I'm seeing pictures of Trump. I'm in a very blue place. I'm not seeing. For most of history, we can live most of our existence without thinking about our leader. And so that. That's a real fear for nations. If you don't think about him, you know, you're not gonna focus on making sure he's powerful. A lot of our visuals are just reminding us that, like, you're part of a continuum. Like a lot of statuary, you're part of this continuum. A lot of money, a lot of this is like, kind of reminding us to be part of the order of the state.

[Jane Marie]

So Trump decides he needs an ark.

[Seema Rao]

Exactly.

[Jane Marie]

And it looks like shit.

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[Seema Rao]

I love it. I love it. I just feel like it is such. It's trash.

[Jane Marie]

Why did he make the worst version?

[Seema Rao]

I think one of the things that I see in Trump and then the people he picked are people who have not worked and failed and succeeded. You know, I. I hear. I think of it every day with, you know, like, everything they say is a. It is a confession. And I think the biggest confession is dei, that they believe that women and black people and people of color were getting special benefits and getting jobs that they deserved. But what they actually don't understand is how you get a job. And I think that's what it is. Trump doesn't know. And, you know, he has been giving all. Getting all these adulation for, really, a show that was produced, right, like the Apprentice. He Wasn't that guy. He was a joke until Reese. Until the Apprentice, really. And he's sort of like a con man, and.

[Jane Marie]

Well, everyone in his cabinet comes from reality television.

[Seema Rao]

Yes, exactly. Exactly.

[Jane Marie]

Okay, so let's just paint the picture of what this display that's supposedly art and experience. Let's. If you can just paint the picture for me of what it actually looks like. The main thing that I noticed is that all of it is 2D.

[Seema Rao]

Yes. That's a great. I hadn't even thought about that. That's so true. Well, and I think also for people who are pushing AI, it's 2D that is. Is sort of very badly modeled, so to look like it's all printed. So basically, you walk into this grassy. I don't want to say grassy knoll. It's more like a grassy field. But you walk through this arch that is a. It's basically made out of plywood. And then it's covered in this printed, like. Looks like vinyl, maybe that is printed to look like an arch. And then only the corners have any kind of detailing, but that's done very shoddily. And they're using, like, you know, that sort of spray caulk and stuff, and it's falling apart. You walk through that, and then.

[Jane Marie]

Wait, what's on top? Let's talk about what's on top.

[Seema Rao]

Oh, yeah. How can I miss that? The ugliest. The ugliest faux gold eagles that you've ever seen. And then, I don't know. Is she Victory? She certainly is. Not compassion or justice or Liberty.

[Jane Marie]

She looks almost like Statue of Liberty.

[Seema Rao]

Oh, well, then she would be Liberty.

[Jane Marie]

But Liberty doesn't have wings.

[Seema Rao]

Oh, yeah, so they do. I just looked it up. It says that they do want her to be Lady Liberty. No, Liberty doesn't have wings. Yeah, that's what. That's what NBC News is reporting.

[Jane Marie]

And made of gold. Supposedly.

[Seema Rao]

Nothing says Liberty like useless waste of money.

[Jane Marie]

Yeah. Keep walking through.

[Seema Rao]

So then you walk in, and then. I am fairly confident that they looked at the idea of a fair and they didn't understand that people expected a street fair or like a. This is not a national thing, but where I grew up, there was a lot of church fairs. So all the churches would raise money every summer and have a big fair. So, you know, you'd have the, you know, like the Greek food or the Russian food or the Syrian food.

[Jane Marie]

You had a midway with a little bit of games and fun. And there were. Nowadays it would be food trucks.

[Seema Rao]

Yes, correct. Exactly. Exactly. So both with the arch and these sort of facades that are just printed, basically. So what you have is basically in Trump's administration, nobody who's ever really had a great job and then also not enough skills to make it look good. Right. So, like, when you're building anything, and I've worked on a lot of museum building projects over the years, you actually need to have a lot of nuanced skills to understand if it's good. Right. Like I, I, somebody asked me about something and I was like, well, they did a really good job with the cement pour. They were like, what? But, you know, I've worked on a lot of architectural projects, you know, but nobody would notice that. But what you can't. So what the problem with a lot of built environment is you don't understand. You might not know what's wrong if you're not skilled, but you know it's not right.

[Jane Marie]

Right.

[Seema Rao]

And that's why the arch and why, that's why everything looks so wonky. It's because everyone is used to things that are good. Right. Like most and especially D.C. if you're wandering through D.C. there's good architecture there. Sure. In comparison, it looks busted.

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[Jane Marie]

Why did they. I mean, I guess the user experience or whatever, the attendee experience. I, I'm baffled as to why it was so underwhelming and not only like the fact that things looked like they had columns, but it was just vinyl sheeting with terrible images but just flat. And why each of the booths had nothing but signage.

[Seema Rao]

I think a lot of it is time. So, so presidents usually like I, I did a write up on Substack that compared Obama and Trump's White Houses, the physical, like what they're doing with it, the first Trump administration, White House and the first Obama. And one of the things that happens is that there's usually like systems in place and so Obama like, you know, usually the, the wife does it and there have been other people I know MAGA loves to remind us that, you know, like, you know, Truman put a lot of work in the Kennedys, but so sometimes some people will do more. But there are like specific rules. Like you're going to pick out a china pattern, you're going to do this. You can't you do that to this room. There's like all these rules and those. That's basically structure that helps it happen quickly because basically from one president to another, it flips. It's like flipping a switch, right? They just move in and then they have to kind of go with it. And so the structure makes it feel seamless because this staff Ideally, though, supposedly Trump has laid off a lot of people. But the staff, ideally, is a nonpartisan. You know, like the people who clean and the people who cook and, you know, like, people who take care of the cars. They're. They understand the building, so they keep the building going no matter what politics happens. That's the ideal. And then what happens is basically that those people who are there from presidency to presidency then can handle some of those things, like making sure that the portrait is done at the right time. And, you know, like, the White House has a. Has a staff that deals with the art they're in. They're supposed to be bipartisan, and so they're there all the time, kind of making sure the art is safe. You know, so. So there's a lot of structure, but that structure means they can do it very quickly. If you do away with the structure like they did with America 250, they don't have. They don't. Then you have to come up with structure very quickly. And that, like, I remember years ago, I. Our city has one of the oldest foundations, the Cleveland Foundation. They're a great organization. I don't work for them, so I don't have any connection. I'm just. It's not a. It's not a, you know, thing they decided they were going to do. I don't know what anniversary it was, but whatever their anniversary was, they had some funds. And so they said, you know, we have this funds. We'd like to have this event. And they, you know, said to all the institutions in town, and they let us do it the way we do our own events. So they didn't make us reinvent how we do events. Right, okay. And so that's how we could do it quickly. And so, you know, like, they wanted to do it quickly, and we said, okay, so then we have to do it the way we do it. And they were like, great. We're like, great.

[Jane Marie]

Right?

[Seema Rao]

You know, and. And there's a lot of very boring things with events. Like, I remember, like, for example, you can't. In. In that event, they would have had to have the right. All of the right paperwork in order to have alcohol or else know that they have to have the signs that say you can't have alcohol. You know, if you already run an event, you already know what paperwork to fill out. Like, so for our event, we didn't. We didn't. We ran it so that. We didn't. We didn't. You know, we. We're an institution that didn't need to have outside alcohol. It was like a family day. So we didn't, you know, and we don't usually have it. We don't have the paperwork. You know, we followed all the rules. We already do. If you have no rules, if you threw them out, you know, you're stuck.

[Jane Marie]

Yeah.

[Seema Rao]

So I think the reason that they didn't even think about experience, design first is time and then two. Truthfully, they didn't care. Right. It's basically about flooding money into their own cronies. Most likely. That's what it seems like. I'm not. I mean, allegedly. So that's the second thing. And then I think the third. Third thing. And this is where I think it's the saddest thing about experience. You cannot make anything for someone if you don't like them. Ooh. You know, like, they don't like people. And I say this as somebody. I have run so many family events because in museums, families are like the bread and butter universe. You know, university students, college students, high school students, but families in. In some context. Right. So I have been doing that since I was 20, 22 years old. And if one of the things that I have known, for all the people who've worked on that, even if you don't know that person who's walking in, you like the idea of that person. People will go to the mat in museums about the craziest things, like the color of a wall. I have absolutely been in a fight with somebody about the color, not myself, but, like, watching two people about the color pink that's used on a wall. Yeah, it matters. Like, I'll tell you, like, I have definitely been in a situation where I can see that that color pink he chose was the right one. You don't need to ever know it. It doesn't matter. And it doesn't. And I think that's the final thing. So you have to love the person, and then finally you have to do it for them. Not you and I of the. I mean, I have interacted with. I mean, the institution I worked at was like a 600 person staff. Right. So over the years, I've interacted with more than a thousand museum professionals. None of them are doing it for. For, like, monetary gain. You're not making a lot of money. But even, like, personal aggrandizement, nobody knows, right? You write that label, nobody knows that. You don't sign it, you're not on it. You know, I was looking. There's been a lot of people in very red counties saying, we're so angry that it was so bad. D.C. is like, maybe six hours for me. I can. You know, it's an easy drive. I've been there a million times. The summer is miserable. It's like a swamp.

[Jane Marie]

It's been 102 degrees.

[Seema Rao]

I know. Like, you couldn't have picked a. I mean, I understand it's fourth July, but,

[Jane Marie]

like, you could have built an interior structure.

[Seema Rao]

Yes.

[Jane Marie]

Like, there's a bunch of things that me, as not an architect or anything, that I would have come up with, like a grand tent. And then to get the participation of the States, which were all of those weird rooms that had nothing going on. Like, I.

[Seema Rao]

It was nothing. It was like coloring sheets. The other thing that makes me nuts is one of the things I think happens. This is not Trump. This is on both sides of the aisle. This is across the board. People assume teaching children. People who teach children are dumb, and it's easy. And then you see what they do, and you're like, see, it's hard. Coloring sheets are the least. Like, they're so boring. You know, I was thinking, like, I was. I was so angry, and I was thinking about what I would do, let's say, like, there was no way on the planet Trump would call me, but let's just say he did. I was thinking about how cool it would be if he took that space and then he made it so like. Like, kind of like Candyland, but inside. But you had these, like, things where you would go around to each of the places. So it could be like the south, the north, or it could be, like, not exactly states, but, like, people could basically get to experience all of the cultures of our country, but not in a way that's map based, because I think that's another thing you could. He could have been doing really cool things. Like, you know, all the Great Lakes could have been together or.

[Jane Marie]

Right.

[Seema Rao]

All of the people who play, like, all of the people from the same division on a sporting thing. Because I think another thing that he lost out on, and he doesn't want any kind of, like, learning or interconnection between people or caring about people. But, you know, I find when I travel, like, we were in. I was in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, once, and my husband. We always joke about this. We were standing there, and we were all like, wait, you have tall ships? Because we have tall ships. You grew up in Michigan. We have them in the Great Lakes. And they were like, wait, really? And I was like, yeah. You know, because, like, the St. Lawrence Seaway. And what I think about the more I've. The older I've gotten is there's more that brings us together than separates us. And if they had found ways to find like really fun interconnections and then have a booth that is air conditioned and you kind of wandered around and you had like a scavenger hunt where you find all the things you could have really changed how we think about this country.

[Jane Marie]

Okay, so a couple stories. I went to the. They had a pop up about Titanic here. It was lovely. I took my daughter and they had this very fun interactive thing where you get a card at the beginning and you are assigned a character, like a person who was on the ship and they don't tell you the fate and you go through the whole exhibit and at the end you have to kind of guess like what happened to your character, whether they lived or died, you know. And it was so cool, like, and it wasn't fancy, you know, it wasn't that elaborate. We got to. I did really love looking at all the dishes. I know, like the china that has been taken from the sea floor.

[Seema Rao]

I know somebody dead ate off of. That's what I said. Yeah, I saw it with friends and I saw, I saw it for a work thing, but I was like, look, it's dead people's china.

[Jane Marie]

Yeah, dead people's china. And my card was just like, you are a 31 year old married woman of this status, blah blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, and then at the very end you figure out whether you lived or died. And it was like just a very simple idea. And this, everything I've seen from this supposed fair was like so sterile and void of any kind of education about like there were states where it was like a car. Like a car. And that was it.

[Seema Rao]

Yeah, I saw that. I don't remember what state it is.

[Jane Marie]

Who cares? Because all states have cars. Literally doesn't matter. But I. Have there been. Like first of all, I feel like they're just not that smart. Have there been presidents who do this right?

[Seema Rao]

I think it's very hard. People will always complain. I think what Gerald Ford had the luck of was he wasn't elected. And so there was very. There were very. I mean he was elected to his office but not to president. And so he was very lucky. It sort of like a stepmom that people like, you know, and he wasn't. He wasn't the guy who just screwed up. So that was good. I think the reason. There's a. The reason the 200 also did well, like I was looking at all this Stuff. And the Gerald Ford Presidential Library has been doing great videos of stuff that happened. One of the very lucky things that happened was that, you know, they. There was a. You know, lot of people were just so thrilled to not have Nixon, to have that part of our time over. We had just ended, you know. You know, like, I can't imagine what it must have been like to live through the Vietnam War. There was so much, you know, just such a tough time. So I think there was a lot of, you know, just. People were just relaxed in that way. I think the other thing that happened that made it really good is what I said. He let everybody. So if you see. If you look at every. All these nonprofits right now, like the Pasadena Library, and, you know, blah, blah, blah, they're all showing pictures from their 1976 celebrations. And so you can see that likely everybody did something. So everyone was creating local memories that would have been huge for Trump. He doesn't realize it, but if he had funneled money back into these communities, they'd have a lot more goodwill, because that wouldn't matter that much when the President puts his visual stamp on it. It's just less likely to succeed. Succeed. So what he didn't do was it's not like there was nothing about. There's not. I mean, you wouldn't. I wouldn't even know what Ford's aesthetic was. You know, like, how would I even know it wasn't. It had nothing to do with him, and it was very smart. So then what our memory is, is tall ships and people in, you know, Betsy Ross hats, so he doesn't get so bogged down with it. You know, I was looking at, like, the Clinton. I've never been to Little Rock, so I've never seen it in real life. But if you look at the library, it's hard. It looks. It just looks so. To me, it looks like because of my baby. It's like when I was a kid or something. But it looks really 90s and sort of tacky. And I think that about. Actually, the Clinton China, Hillary Clinton's China from their presidency, is what Trump used when Charles III was here. And it looks so. To me, I just feels like that, like, 90s, sort of Laura Ashley. I just, you know, and I think, you know, just. I think for all of us, the thing. The problem is that taste is personal. And so when they. When presidents make it super, super personal, just like, you know, Melania doing whatever she did last Christmas, it makes it too easy a target.

[Jane Marie]

The Oval Office is now these I think plaster.

[Seema Rao]

Yes. They're not even plaster. The polyurethane. I look them up. They're from. Oh, they're from Home Depot. Yeah. Are you kidding me? No, no, no. I looked it up and then somebody else also published it there.

[Jane Marie]

It's a Home Depot stuff that he spray painted gold.

[Seema Rao]

Yes. Yeah. What a door colored. So you'll have to spray the. Paint them yourself.

[Jane Marie]

What a dork that he thinks doing that. And it's similar to the arch at the failed fair. He. He thinks that it shows power.

[Seema Rao]

Yes. Dictator decor. I think it actually goes back to my points about the fair or our points. I think we were both saying this, that when you make something and you don't know who, you don't care about the person who it's for. You don't care how it's perceived. Right. So he is saying what he perceives as powerful. And so he saw gold as powerful. He's always used it to see it's powerful. And because he doesn't have a positive feedback loop, you know, I always say, I was saying to my friend the other day, when my kids do something good, I work really hard to make sure to say it a couple times, oh, thanks for doing the dishes. Thanks for doing the dishes. Because I believe in positive feedback loops. So for Trump, because he never had the opposite negative feedback loops. Like, nobody was like. Because he was such a laughingstock and he didn't notice, you know, for his, like his Ivana, his gold, everyone always laughed about it, but he didn't notice it. Right. He's like, you know, so he never had a negative feedback loop. He never had really any positive feedback loops. He's just, he's just like self. He's just decided gold is cool. One of the things that happens in societies is that class is something that we all understand the one we're born to. And so in an American society, because we pretend ourselves to be non hierarchical, the norms are even more subtle, but even more enforced. Because unlike a very stratified society, the English society with a aristocrats or Indian society with the caste system, that there is no structure other than the thing we can't talk about. And so what Trump has is because he didn't grow up in Manhattan, he didn't grow up old money, his father made his money. They are the quintessential new money. And so what happens with new money is that they have to show off very quickly. And so one thing that is very interesting to me about Trump is compared to, say, Clinton, Clinton is, is like, even less new money. Right. Like, but Clinton very carefully understood. And, you know, he. I remember I, I know so many people who know this story, whose parents went to Georgetown that. Or whose mothers went to Georgetown, who said, like, he knew all the girls, like, the first day of, you know, like, everybody knew him because he would always, like, go to the dorms to meet the girls. And, like, he was very charming. But one of the things a lot of people said who went to college, who. A lot of people I know who knew him when he was young was that he was a very astute about class, and he understood that he couldn't become their class. So, you know, like, a lot of his down. I don't know Arkansas well enough to know, but, like, that he, he's not as down home as he acts.

[Jane Marie]

Right.

[Seema Rao]

But he knew he couldn't be their class.

[Jane Marie]

Right.

[Seema Rao]

And so what I think is part of it is that Trump doesn't know he can't be their class. So he is defining. He's thinking that he is defining old, old money, but he can't because he can't see it.

[Jane Marie]

I think of him as a pretender to the throne.

[Seema Rao]

Oh, that's wonderful. Yes.

[Jane Marie]

Right.

[Seema Rao]

Yes, that is.

[Jane Marie]

He really believes that this is his destiny because I, I guess his dad told him. I don't know who told him that, but.

[Seema Rao]

Or he told himself. You know, another thing when you say the pretender, I think is interesting is I do think that the second Trump administration, they, they know that he. He's definitely slipped from the last one intellectually, but I think because he constantly talks about Elon Musk stealing the election. I mean, I have no idea if he did or not. It doesn't matter. But what I do think he, he acts like. I hadn't thought about until you said that, but that he acts like someone who knows he shouldn't be there and he's getting away with it.

[Jane Marie]

Right, Right.

[Seema Rao]

And I think you're right. I think that's very true. And I think, like, even I. What I had been thinking, not pretend to the throne, but I think he. He's worried about his legacy because, like, really, the Arch, you would have to win something. Even the Arc de Triomphe. He, you know, Napoleon did win. He lost in the end, but, you know, he had victories. Right. So, like, you know, so, like, you have to win something which Trump has not yet won. And so he is putting that up in hopes that the victory he has is his memory. And he's not. I mean, you know, he, no matter how dumb the man is. He's got to know. He's not.

[Jane Marie]

He must. I mean, he's the most insecure person on the planet. And because you wouldn't have to act this stuff out so aggressively if you had confidence of any sort. Like. And he talks in superlatives. That's the other thing that really irritates me about him is. And it shows his weakness and his insecurity. He speaks about, you know, whenever he talks. It's the greatest. This. It's the best. Whatever. I've done more than this person. I've done more. Like that speech.

[Seema Rao]

Yeah.

[Jane Marie]

That habit of speaking that way is, like, so sad and insecure.

[Seema Rao]

Yes, Very true. I hadn't thought about that. I'm definitely. That's very, very true. It's interesting because, like, when you teach and they. I've seen it happen often with students that the ones who give the most nuanced answers are the ones who've actually worked the hardest. So I think it's also the opposite. Like, he doesn't do anything right, so he has to say it's the best.

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[Jane Marie]

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This season.

[Jane Marie]

Visit pura.com to find your new new favorite summer scent. Did you hear where the storm came through on the 4th of July or the 5th and everyone had to take shelter in the African American History Museum?

[Seema Rao]

Yes.

[Jane Marie]

Thoughts?

[Seema Rao]

So I, I was still in, I was, I remember when that opened and a lot of people I totally adore worked on those installations. And the early social media team, I don't know him well, but I've certainly met Lonnie Bunch. So all of the original staff. And I vividly remember one of the things I was talking to somebody, I was sitting at a conference was before it opened, I was sitting next to one of the curatorial staff and we were at the national conference or something and, and, and she was sitting there and I was like, oh, it's such a big deal. And it was before it opened. So it was a really big deal in museum work, but not publicly yet, you know, because we were museums, museums, like, you know, we'll, we'll, we'll be, you know, chit chatting in meetings or whatever. So, so I was saying to her, oh, you're a new team, you know, you know, you know what's going on. And one of the things I really appreciated was that she was saying that the, they were trying to create a space that felt comfortable. So because there's a lot of discomfort in the ideas, this is something I don't think people realize. But there's some rules that are steadfast for museums. So museums, for example, will always have to, they have to defer to the object's lighting needs. So even if it would be a better artwork if there was more light on it, if it's light sensitive, they cannot put, bring up the light. Right? That's going to be the rules. But then after that, there's a lot of things that museums do to push the museum experience a certain way. So for example, let's say a gallery is going to have so many, so many, so many visitors, they might not put as many chairs in there because they need the people to keep moving. They might do that on purpose. Right? So museums do make choices about how they want people to function in that space. So seating is one of them, but actually one of the bigger ones is how they want you to feel. And so things like if an exhibition, I worked on a Kara Walker exhibition Sometimes what they do is they purposefully don't have bright colors in the spaces because the art is so hard. It's such challenging stuff. And so actually, white space in the walls is comfort. It allows you to. Or, like, they'll put chairs right out. If you see. If you go to any exhibition that's very, very emotionally challenging, they often have. They often have benches right outside, and that's comfort.

[Jane Marie]

So wait, how did you get into this work? Like, what's your background?

[Seema Rao]

So I have a very traditional museum background. I took art history at the Cleveland Museum of Art in high school, and I just really loved it. And then I went to college, and my high school art teacher thought, well, I was. I was a very good draftsman. One of the things that I think happens in high school is that we. They. They're nervous about you going to college, and they try to find things that you could probably do. Yeah. I know this because then I went on to work with high school students, and so I could draw very well. And so my teacher said, oh, you should be. My high school art teacher said, you could be a medical illustrator. You can draw. You can render. That's. I mean, I wouldn't say that. Like. Like, I'm super interested in drawing, but I can ren. I could render pretty well. I could render well. So I went to college and thought about doing medical illustration. And I got there, and I had a wonderful professor. He was in People's 50 Most Beautiful People.

[Jane Marie]

Oh, yeah.

[Seema Rao]

Yeah. And he was. He was nothing like that. He was very, very nice and very smart. His name was Paul Serino, and I took a couple class, and he was like, you know, you really could do this, but I want you to talk to my illustrator because you had. Don't have the. You don't have the personality for it. And I'm so glad he said that, because art history and museum. Museum work is very. Cutting, cutthroat. It's very. There's very few jobs, but medical illustration has even fewer jobs. And what happens is. And I've had this conversation with, like, scores and scores of people since I was 18 years old. But if you can draw well, they often will give you. That is the thing you should do as a job. So lots of kids try to get into it. And so very early on, I realized that's not for me because it's a very interior job, and it's. It's incredibly competitive, but in a way that is. It just. It's like you're fighting against someone you'll never meet. You know what I mean? I was like, that's not for me. So I very quickly figured out in college I started docenting. And so I realized I really enjoy talking to people about art. And so that's how I sort of did it. When I was in high school, I should say that I had some really formative experiences in galleries. One of the things I really encourage every person to do is to go to museums at an off hour. So like 3:30 in the afternoon is usually pretty much the off hour. It's when school tour, you know, school is out, so there's no school tours. And none of the evening programs have started, especially if it's a day that they have a late evening because they're getting ready for whatever. And so the galleries are usually pretty empty, even at the busiest museums. And I can tell you this, I've done this at like, you know, the, the National Gallery in the uk. I've done it at the Louvre. You can go at that weird hour and just be with art by yourself and just look at it like nobody's telling you what to think. There's no, there's not going to be like a tour going through. Nobody's saying anything. And when I was in high school, because the Cleveland Museum art is free and my parents worked around the corner, I had a lot of those kinds of formative experiences of just looking at stuff, not really being told what to say or think.

[Jane Marie]

Right.

[Seema Rao]

Which is so. I mean, we have so few times where there's not a right answer.

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[Jane Marie]

$25 unlimited plan summer smells like salt in the air and warm sand Restore your sense of place with Pura's new Summer Fragran Collection. Discover transportive clean scents at pura. Com.