拍品專文
With its compressed ball and columnar support, the design of this stand identifies it as a product of Philadelphia. Referred to by local cabinetmakers during the 18th century as a "folding stand", the cost of such a form with "box [birdcage] plain top & feet" was 1:15:0 (see Jobe and Kaye, New England Furniture: The Colonial Era (Boston, 1984), p. 304). Aesthetically simple, yet multi-functional forms such as this were made and were in demand from the second quarter through the fourth quarter of the 18th century, and appeared in a number of variations on the same design theme. Two examples of the form with differing proportions and attenuations of the same ball and column claw table idea are illustrated, compared and discussed in John Kirk, Early American Furniture (New York, 1970), p. 152, figs. 156 and 157. Regarding a comparable example with ball-and-claw as opposed to the slipper feet seen here, Joseph Dwons suggested that the form's aesthetic progressiveness could be gauged in the design of its feet (Downs, American Furniture: The Queen Anne and Chippendale Periods (New York, 1952), fig. 280). For additional related examples, see Daughters of the American Revolution, In the Style of the Signers: The Decorative Arts of Philadelphia (Washington, D.C., 1987), fig. 21; and American Antiques from Israel Sack Collection, vol. 2, no. 15, p. 401, no. 1011.