These superb chairs are among the most accomplished expressions of Late Baroque New England seating furniture. Their overall form is akin to the standard pattern (see B.69.247.1); however, a series of refinements sets them apart. These details include the flat, curvilinear stretchers, molded C-scrolls and lambrequins on the knees, and scalloped seat rails on the front and sides. Previously, they were attributed to Newport, but scholarship and visual evidence, such as John Singleton Copley’s portrait of the Boston merchant John Barrett delineating similar ornament on his chair, support a Boston attribution.

Technical notes: Black walnut, soft maple (rear seat rail, stretcher); soft maple (slip seat). The construction is typical of New England chairs from this period (see B.57.75). Period English needlework was adapted for the seats. The front seat rail of B.60.31.1 is incised V, its slip seat, III, while the corresponding elements on B.60.31.2 are marked IIII.

Related examples: The closest published examples are Downs 1952, no. 110; Sack 1969–92, vol. 3, p. 607, no. 1381; Randall 1965, pp. 170–71, no. 133.

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.