AN UNUSUAL HUANGHUALI MEDITATION CHAIR, CHANYI

Details

AN UNUSUAL HUANGHUALI MEDITATION CHAIR, CHANYI
17TH CENTURY

The back a plain frame of elegant proportions, the slender arms supported at right angles on straight front posts, the large square frame with soft-mat seating, above humpback stretchers with pillar-shaped struts, the legs of circular section with squared inner corners joined by the stepped stretcher frame and footrest, backrail a replacement
33½in. (85cm.) high, 29½in. (75cm.) wide, 29½in. (75cm.) deep

Literature

Sarah Handler, "Classical Chinese Furniture in the Renaissance Collection", Orientations, January 1991, p. 44, fig. 4
Sarah Handler, "A Ming Meditating Chair in Bauhaus Light", JCCFS, Winter 1992, pp. 26-38, front and back covers
Leslie Lackman Mott, "The Challenge of Simplicity: An Interview with James Kline", JCCFS, Spring 1993, p. 54, fig. 1
Wang et al., Masterpieces from the Museum of Classical Chinese Furniture, p. 72, no. 34

Lot Essay

For a history of the meditation chair, which falls developmentally between the 'big chair' popular in the Song dynasty and the 'rose chair' which was used in the Ming, see Wang et al., p. 72

It appears that these chairs were probably intended to be used with an independent, removable backrest which would have been attached to the backrail. Refer to the meditation chair, complete with removable backrest, illustrated in the Ever Art advertisement in Orientations, September 1994