Eames House Bird Sighting

“Pacific Standard Time” promos are pairing pop culture and art figures. Floating around the web is this pre-release poster. (Ice Cube’s quote is Latin placeholder text.) Perhaps more unexpected than Ice Cube as Eames spokesperson is the object chosen to represent the Eameses: the “House Bird.”
It’s not the most familiar Eames object, and in fact, the House Bird is not an Eames design at all. It’s a work of American folk art, c. 1910 from the Appalachian region, that the Eames found in their travels. They installed it in their Pacific Palisades living room as part of their “collage” of modern and modernesque bric-a-brac. The Eames House is currently undergoing renovation, and the contents of the living room will be transported to the Resnick Pavilion for LACMA’s “California Design, 1930-1965: ‘Living in a Modern Way’” (opening Oct. 1).
The House Bird became a trademark prop in many Eames photographs, notably the famous publicity photo for the Eames Wire Chairs (bottom). That’s presumably not the original bird on Ice Cube’s shoulder; Vitra now markets an Eames-estate-licensed reproduction.
http://blogs.artinfo.com/lacmonfire/2011/09/16/eames-house-bird-sighting/