Side Chair (one of a pair)

CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Side Chair (one of a pair)
Datec. 1760–1815
Made inNew York, United States
MediumSoft maple, hickory, yellow-poplar, and sweetgum
Dimensions40 1/2 × 21 3/4 × 16 1/2 in. (102.9 × 55.2 × 41.9 cm)
Credit LineThe Bayou Bend Collection, gift of Miss Ima Hogg
Object numberB.69.510.2
Current Location
Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens
Maple Bedroom
Exposé

Explore Further

Department
Bayou Bend
Object Type
Description

This type of rush-bottom chair with vase-shaped splat, yoke crest, and tubular front legs with pad feet was produced in great numbers in New York as well as adjacent New Jersey and Connecticut. The tubular leg and foot motif may be derived from chairs produced in northern England. Although the ball-and-ring stretcher, vase splat, and pad feet are all elements seen in the early Baroque period, these chairs continued to be made in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Technical notes: B.69.510.1, soft maple (legs, front seat rail), hickory (stretchers, side and rear seat rails), yellow-poplar (splat), sweetgum (crest rail, stay rail), rush (replaced); B.69.510.2, soft maple (legs, front stretcher), hickory (remaining stretchers, rear and side seat rails), yellow-poplar (crest rail, splat), eastern white pine (stay rail, exposed corners of front seat rail), cherry (front seat rail), rush (replaced); WS branded on back (probably the mark of an owner).

Related examples: A pair at MMA bears the stamp of Michael Smith (Heckscher 1985, p. 61, no. 20); Mabel Brady Garvan Collection (Kane 1976, pp. 103–4, no. 88).

Book excerpt: Warren, David B., Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1998.


ProvenanceMiss Ima Hogg, prior to 1965; given to MFAH, 1969.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
[no inscriptions]
Branded on back: WS [probably mark of an owner]

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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scan from file photograph
c. 1760–1815
Soft maple, hickory, yellow-poplar, and sweetgum
B.69.510.1
scan from file photograph
c. 1820–1835
Maple, hickory, yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hard maple; original painted decoration
B.67.30.5,.6
Side Chair
c. 1780–1800
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hickory
B.69.405
Armchair
c. 1790–1805
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hickory
B.69.435
Armchair
c. 1790–1800
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hickory
B.69.434
Armchair
c. 1770–1785
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, red oak, and hickory (both handholds are replacements made of ash)
B.79.204
Armchair
c. 1795–1815
Soft maple, oak, hickory, and yellow-poplar
B.79.205
Settee
c. 1780–1800
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hickory
B.69.421
Armchair
c. 1765–1775
Soft maple, white oak, hickory, and yellow-poplar
B.69.424
scan from file photograph
c. 1775–1785
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hickory
B.72.26
Armchair
c. 1790–1810
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, and hickory
B.69.415
Armchair
c. 1765–1770
Yellow-poplar, soft maple, ash, and hickory
B.69.413