拍品专文
Formerly regionally atributed to the South and related to a group of Rhode Island furniture, the Federal inlaid chairs illustrated here are part of a larger tradition of furniture with a documented history of ownership in New York. Although stamped "Anderson" on the underside of the seatrail, several Anderson worked as cabinetmakers in late 18th century New York City. These cabinetmakers include both Elbert Anderson Sr. and Jr., Andrew Anderson, Alexander Anderson Sr. and Jr., Samuel Anderson. John B. Anderson and Walter Anderson (see Greenlaw, "A New York Sideboard in the Colonial Williamsburg Collection: A Reattribution," The Magazine Antiques, May 1987, vol. CV, no. 5, pp. 1155-1161. Among these the most prolific appears to have been Elbert Anderson, Sr., to whom a comparable set of chairs was attributed by Joseph Downs; a labelled sideboard by Elert Anderson, Sr., however, provides scant evidence, even in its enthusiastic use of shaded quarter-fan inlay, to support this attribution (see The Magazine Antiques, June 1981, CXIX, no. 6, p. 1221).
While the highly unusual back of this chair is loosely frelated to several designs published over a broad period of time including palgte XXXV of Ince and Mayhew, The Universal System of Household Furnishing, London, 1762 as well as plates 3 and 11 of A. Hepplewhite & Co., The Cabinetmaker's and Upholsterer's Guide, London 1788, the closest design source for this highly idiosyncratic design may not be a chair form at all. Plate LXXXV, a "Common Chinese Fence," of E. Hoppus, The Gentelman and Builder's Repository, 4th edition, London 1760 shows a lattice patterned design characterised by two astragal-form lozenges suspended within a larger simple frame.
A chair from the same set, now in the collection of the Albany Institute of History and Art, is illustrated and discussed in Greenlaw, "A New York Sideboard in the Colonial Williamsburg Colelction: A Reattribution," The Magazine Antiques, May 1987, vol. CV, no. 5, pp. 1155-1161; p. 1160, fig. 7. An identical pair of chairs descended in the Van Cortland family is in the collection of the Museum of the City of New York, and is illsutrated in Miller, V.I. Furniture by New York Cabinetmakers, 1680-1860, Museum of the City of New York, cat. no. 89. For a related group of chairs, see Christie's, Important American Furniture, Folk Art and Decorative Arts, 23 October 1993, lot 246; as well as Hipkiss, Eighteenth Century American Arts: The M. and M. Karolik Collection, (Boston, 1941), p. 176, no. 113. For a group of chairs attributed to Elbert Anderson, see Downs, American Furniture: The Queen Anne and Chippendale Periods (Winterthur, 1952), p;2/52, 53. This chair is recorded in the Winterthur Museum: Decorative Arts Photographic Collection, acc. no. 74.5884.
While the highly unusual back of this chair is loosely frelated to several designs published over a broad period of time including palgte XXXV of Ince and Mayhew, The Universal System of Household Furnishing, London, 1762 as well as plates 3 and 11 of A. Hepplewhite & Co., The Cabinetmaker's and Upholsterer's Guide, London 1788, the closest design source for this highly idiosyncratic design may not be a chair form at all. Plate LXXXV, a "Common Chinese Fence," of E. Hoppus, The Gentelman and Builder's Repository, 4th edition, London 1760 shows a lattice patterned design characterised by two astragal-form lozenges suspended within a larger simple frame.
A chair from the same set, now in the collection of the Albany Institute of History and Art, is illustrated and discussed in Greenlaw, "A New York Sideboard in the Colonial Williamsburg Colelction: A Reattribution," The Magazine Antiques, May 1987, vol. CV, no. 5, pp. 1155-1161; p. 1160, fig. 7. An identical pair of chairs descended in the Van Cortland family is in the collection of the Museum of the City of New York, and is illsutrated in Miller, V.I. Furniture by New York Cabinetmakers, 1680-1860, Museum of the City of New York, cat. no. 89. For a related group of chairs, see Christie's, Important American Furniture, Folk Art and Decorative Arts, 23 October 1993, lot 246; as well as Hipkiss, Eighteenth Century American Arts: The M. and M. Karolik Collection, (Boston, 1941), p. 176, no. 113. For a group of chairs attributed to Elbert Anderson, see Downs, American Furniture: The Queen Anne and Chippendale Periods (Winterthur, 1952), p;2/52, 53. This chair is recorded in the Winterthur Museum: Decorative Arts Photographic Collection, acc. no. 74.5884.