AN IMPORTANT SET OF GEORGE III MAHOGANY DINING-CHAIRS

AFTER A DESIGN BY THOMAS CHIPPENDALE, ELEVEN CHAIRS CIRCA 1755, TOGETHER WITH ONE LATER COPY

细节

AN IMPORTANT SET OF GEORGE III MAHOGANY DINING-CHAIRS
After a design by Thomas Chippendale, eleven chairs circa 1755, together with one later copy
Each serpentine crestrail above an interlaced pierced splat headed by foliate confronting c-scrolls, the drop-in seats upholstered in pale yellow floral silk damask, on cabriole legs headed by foliate confronting c-scrolls, with scrolled toes, the later copy stamped by maker William Blair (12)

来源

Almost certainly supplied to D'Arcy Burnell (d.1774) for the Saloon at Winkburn Hall, Newark, Nottinghamshire in circa 1755.
Thence by family descent at Winkburn to Assheton Craven-Smith-Milne, Esq., also of Hockerton Manor, Nottinghamshire, offered Sotheby's London, 10 March 1933, lot 178 (the eleven chairs together with a triple-chair-back settee en suite).
Sold privately to Sir Arthur Wilmot.
Thence by descent to Sir Robert Wilmot, Bt., Pitcairlie, Newburgh, Fife.
Acquired from Norman Adams Ltd., London.

出版

C.Claxton Stevens and S.Whittington, Eighteenth Century English Furniture: The Norman Adams Collection, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1983, pp.48-49.

拍品专文

This set of chairs, together with a matching settee, was almost certainly supplied to D'Arcy Burnell (d.1774) for the Saloon at Winkburn Hall in Nottinghamshire. D'Arcy Burnell inherited the estate in 1748 and, following his marriage in the same year, almost immediately set about making improvements on the house and its interiors. The Saloon, later used as a dining room, was redecorated in the manner fashionable at that time combining rococo, gothic and chinese attributes evident in the fantastically carved frieze reminiscent of carver Luke Lightfoot's work (see G.Jackson-Stops, 'Winkburn Hall, Nottinghamshire', Country Life, 6 June 1991, p.104). The suite would have suitably occupied this room with its gothic arched backs pierced with foliate scrolls taken directly after a pattern published in Thomas Chippendale's The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director of 1754, plate XII (reproduced here: a copy of the 1754 Director is being sold as the following lot). As a tribute to its popularity, this highly desirable chair-back pattern actually features twice in Chippendale's later edition published in 1762 (plates XIII and XIV).

A set of chairs almost certainly supplied by Chippendale himself to Sir Rowland Winn, Bt. for Nostell Priory in Yorkshire features the same pattern back. An example from this set is illustrated in C.Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, London, 1978, vol.I, p.174 and vol.II, pl.131. This pattern appears on further examples including a pair of side chairs at Temple Newsam House, Leeds (illustrated in C.Gilbert, Furniture at Temple Newsam House and Lotherton Hall, London, 1978, vol.II, no.74, p.88) and one in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (illustrated in R.Edwards and P.Macquoid, eds., The Dictionary of English Furniture, London, rev.edn., 1954, vol.I, p.278, fig.164). The above examples are more simplified versions of the design with straight legs. A closely related pair with carved cabriole legs is in the Noel Terry Collection (see P.Brown, ed., The Noel Terry Collection of Furniture and Clocks, London, 1987, p.61).

The settee from this suite was sold by Sotheby's London, 7 November 1997, lot 47 (36,700=$61,650).