Lot Essay
This chair, carved with exotic meandering flowers, demonstates the fusion of Dutch and Oriental influences in Dutch colonial furniture in the late 1700s. This model derives from the so-called 'Spanish' chair, which was made in the Netherlands throughout the 17th Century, whereas the characteristic floral carving was developed on the Coromandel Coast in India and subsequently spread to the other Dutch territories. This style was imported to Indonesia through the transport of enslaved Indian craftsmen and through items of furniture, which accompanied V.O.C. employees. In the early phase of the devopement of this type of furniture, between 1650-1680, the floral carving had a flat appearance, which is generally called 'low-relief'. (J. Veenendaal, Furniture from Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India, Delft, 1985, pp. 21-29)
Towards the end of the 17th Century a new style of furniture bacame fashionable. The main difference with the preceding era is the decoration of large scupturally carved flowers, which Veenendaal calls 'half-relief' carving. This distinction was already made at that time, as we see from the inventory of Conelia Linis, the widow of the clergyman Johannes Vermeer, dated 1690, which mentions, in the front room, 'twelve high kaliatur chairs'. This new floral motif was developed around 1680, probably also on the Coromandel coast, and was rapidly introduced in other Dutch territories, again through the influx of slaves from India to Indonesia, but also through the transport of gravestones with similar borders, which were used as ballast on V.O.C. ships and additionally through samples of Indian textiles. (Veenendaal, ibid, pp. 47-55)
Ebony and ebonised chairs of the type mentioned above were already being imported into England and the Netherlands during the second half of the 17th century. Dutch colonial ebony chairs were considered entirely appropriate for the decoration of 'romantic' anitquarian interiors in England and to a lesser extent in the Netherlands throughout the second half of the 18th and most of the 19th centuries as they were throught to be Tudor. This tradition was compounded by Horace Walpole at the time he was furnishing his Gothic mansion, Strawberry Hill in Middlesex. Having seen a pair of ebony chairs in Esher Place, Surrey, where Cardinal Wolsey had lived from 1519, he immediately, but wrong, associated them with Wolsey, compounding a tradition, which survived for many years. (C. Wainwright, 'Only the True Black Blood', Furniture History Society Journal, XXI (1985), pp. 250-254)
See illustration
Towards the end of the 17th Century a new style of furniture bacame fashionable. The main difference with the preceding era is the decoration of large scupturally carved flowers, which Veenendaal calls 'half-relief' carving. This distinction was already made at that time, as we see from the inventory of Conelia Linis, the widow of the clergyman Johannes Vermeer, dated 1690, which mentions, in the front room, 'twelve high kaliatur chairs'. This new floral motif was developed around 1680, probably also on the Coromandel coast, and was rapidly introduced in other Dutch territories, again through the influx of slaves from India to Indonesia, but also through the transport of gravestones with similar borders, which were used as ballast on V.O.C. ships and additionally through samples of Indian textiles. (Veenendaal, ibid, pp. 47-55)
Ebony and ebonised chairs of the type mentioned above were already being imported into England and the Netherlands during the second half of the 17th century. Dutch colonial ebony chairs were considered entirely appropriate for the decoration of 'romantic' anitquarian interiors in England and to a lesser extent in the Netherlands throughout the second half of the 18th and most of the 19th centuries as they were throught to be Tudor. This tradition was compounded by Horace Walpole at the time he was furnishing his Gothic mansion, Strawberry Hill in Middlesex. Having seen a pair of ebony chairs in Esher Place, Surrey, where Cardinal Wolsey had lived from 1519, he immediately, but wrong, associated them with Wolsey, compounding a tradition, which survived for many years. (C. Wainwright, 'Only the True Black Blood', Furniture History Society Journal, XXI (1985), pp. 250-254)
See illustration