A haunted painting, a pretty art dealer in danger. Sounds like a job for Dean Winchester. Oh, wait…
Pre-show notes
Provenance is one of those episodes I remember very well, but not for itself. It’s a stand-alone, having no real impact on the ongoing story, no particular character development. I don’t remember any new insights into the Winchesters or their mission.
And yet it’s a solid episode with a haunted or cursed painting at the centre of the plot. If I’m remembering it correctly, it has more the feel of modern horror than of its time. The biggest horror movies in 2005 were remakes and sequels; Amityville, Saw II, and the like. Provenance feels like the Conjuring franchise to me – something which I suspect was influenced a lot by Supernatural.
Episode Notes
Dean is flirting with women in a bar while Sam looks for a new hunt. Dean’s subduction technique is horrific: he’s claiming to be a producer from LA. Even if it’s unlikely the girl believes him, that does not sit right with me. Sam has picked up on a double murder that fits a pattern John identified in his journal.
When they get there, they find the dead couple’s house has been emptied. There are no signs of haunting, so the brothers conclude that there must be a cursed object in play. They quickly locate the auction house which is selling off the dead couple’s possessions and there’s a pre-auction showing on so they head inside. Dean behaves like a total ass so no one is going to believe Sam’s story that they are art dealers. Well, neither of them exactly looks the part but Dean really is sabotaging the whole thing.
Oh – Enter Sarah Blake, who walks in like a glamour model in a perfume ad and spots Sam eyeing up the creepy painting. She tests his knowledge of American Primitive. I have no idea what that is, but Sam does, and there’s a teeny spark between them before her Dad shows up and kicks our heroes out. Sarah tells Daddy that was rude, but actually, no. Dean was being rude, and being thrown out was the least he deserved.
Outside, Dean’s confused by Sam’s art smarts. It’s like he doesn’t remember his brother is Stanford educated. And their motel room is a different kind of work of art. Dean talks Sam into asking Sarah on a date to get information, and Sam doesn’t need that much persuading. They’re at one of those fancy restaurants where they hand you a wine list and look down their nose if you order the wrong one. Sarah saves Sam by ordering beer. It seems like a real date and they like each other. Sarah still thinks he’s an art dealer and hands over copies of the provenances for the estate. This makes it easy enough for the brothers to identify the painting as the cursed object. They break into the auction house, cut the painting out of its frame and burn it. But we’re only 14 minutes into the episode, so we know it’s not going to be that easy. Sure enough, as the canvas burns, the painting reforms itself in the frame.
In the morning, Dean is freaking out over a lost wallet – he tells Sam he thinks he dropped it in the warehouse, which of course will place them there and get them both arrested. So they head back, and it turns out Dean’s playing matchmaker for Sam and Sarah. Sam sees the intact painting and behaves like a crazy person.
Local history fills in the background of the family in the painting: there’s a news article about the family being slaughtered in a murder-suicide. Along with the article they find a picture that matches the painting, only the figures in the painting have moved. Creepy.
Meanwhile Sarah’s dad has sold the painting on to a new victim.
Dean’s trying to talk Sam into hooking up with Sarah. He doesn’t get it. Sam wants a relationship, not a one night stand, and he can’t have that when he’s living on the road.
The new owner of the painting has hung the ugly-ass think in her living room. But not for long. The brothers and Sarah reach the house at the same time, but too late to save her.
Sam tells Sarah the truth. She saw the painting move, and saw the body in the house, so she doesn’t instantly reject it. The go back to the crime scene to compare the real painting to the one from the archive and notice a few changes. One leads them to local graveyards looking for the Merchant family crypt. Sarah tags along.
“So, is this what you guys do for a living?”
“Not exactly. We don’t get paid.”
Sarah and Sam
Turns out the family’s bodies were cremated after the murder, but the urn that should hold Isiah’s ashes is missing. Dean tracks down where he was buried and they head out to dig up the grave. Sarah is weirdly okay with the grave desecration.
Along the way Sam and Sarah have a wee heart to heart and he admits he’s afraid to start a relationship with her because people around him get hurt. Sarah calls him out on the whole chivalry thing but I don’t think she really gets it. Sam isn’t talking about accidents: Jessica was murdered in front of him.
They head back to burn the painting (because that worked so well the first time) and discover the little girl and the razor are missing from the painting. Sam figures out – much too late – that she’s the killer, not her father. Sarah figures out that the girl’s doll was made with her real hair, so while Dean speeds back to the graveyard to burn the doll, Sam must hold off the girl’s ghost. Dean gets it just in time. Sarah burns the painting – we don’t see it, but hopefully this time it took.
Sam and Sarah say goodbye; Sam says he’ll visit, but I don’t think she believes him.
Associations
I mentioned The Conjuring above so let’s talk about that first. It does feature a kind of haunted painting: Ed’s portrait of the scary nun which turns out to be an image of the demon Valek, and she does appear to leave the painting in order to do harm.
But for me the strongest association I have for this episode is a Sapphire and Steel story – the “Man without a face” in which people appear to emerge from old photographs, and other people disappear from real live and are trapped in photos. That was scary stuff.
Provenance was probably at least partly inspired by the real-life haunted painting The Hands Resist Him, which according to its legend depicts characters who can mysteriously leave the painting at night.
Final thoughts
Paintings always creeped me out. I can’t sleep with a painting watching me though I have no trouble with photographs.
Sarah is a good match for Sam at this stage of his life and it’s a pity they didn’t stretch it out a bit further. But the episode is essentially filler. I think it’s one I would show to a friend if I were recommending the series, because it stands alone nicely, but as we approach the end of the season I’m more interested in drawing the threads of the ongoing plot together, which this episode fails to do.
