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Banister-back armchair

Object number

RIF5988

Maker

Maker Unknown

Dimensions

43 × 23 1/2 × 19 in. (109.22 × 59.69 × 48.26 cm)

Date

1720–60

Current location

Private collection

Geography

Made in Rhode Island
(view a map of Rhode Island)

Medium

Ash (stretchers, front legs, arms, lower back rail, spindles, and crest rail); maple (rear posts)

Marks

None

Inscriptions

None

Style

William and Mary, Vernacular

Provenance

Anthony Werneke, Inc., Pond Eddy, New York; sold to private collection, 1991

Associated names

Anthony Werneke, Inc.

Construction

The double-arched crest rail has a beaded front top edge and is tenoned into its flanking stiles, each joint showing one wood pin in the back only. The top and ends of the crest rail back are chamfered. Four split banisters below, flat in front and rounded in back, match the turnings of the stiles and are tenoned into the underside of the crest rail and the top of the lower rail, which is flat in front, has a formerly double-serpentine skirt (now broken), and is chamfered at the ends where it is tenoned into the stiles. Serpentine arms are tenoned and wood pinned to the stiles and to the tops of the front legs/arm supports. The rush-covered seat rails are doweled into the legs, as are the front turned stretchers, the pairs of plain side stretchers, and the plain single rear stretcher. Examined by P. E. Kane and J. N. Johnson, April 21, 2014; notes compiled by T. B. Lloyd.

Bibliography

Patricia E. Kane et al., Art and Industry in Early America: Rhode Island Furniture, 1650–1830, exh. cat. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Art Gallery, 2016), 187n1.