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拍品專文
Finely crafted in Providence and labeled by its retailer in Charleston, South Carolina, this bureau with dressing glass is an important document of the movement of furniture and the dissemination of designs in early nineteenth-century America. Though fragmented, enough of the label survives to indicate it is that of William Rhoades Rawson (1785-1835), one of the sons of Joseph Rawson, Sr. (1760-1835) of the Providence family of cabinetmakers. Furthermore, the address at 86 Meeting Street indicates that it was used between late 1817 and 1819, when William operated his business from that address. As evidenced by advertisements and shipping records, William Rawson received numerous shipments from "his" or "the" "Manufactory at the North" from 1816 to 1820. The use of the singular strongly suggests that his family's business, then Joseph Rawson & Son, was his sole supplier and that furniture bearing his label was most likely made by the firm. Furthermore, this bureau relates to three slightly earlier bureaus attributed to the firm that appear to have been modeled after a fourth example attributed to Thomas Seymour (1771-1848) of Boston. Like Seymour craftsmanship, the bureau offered here displays mahogany drawer sides, a refined and costly detail that may represent another instance of the Rawson cabinetmakers emulating the Seymour shop. The son of Grindal Rawson (1719-1803), who began the family's cabinetmaking tradition in the 1740s, Joseph Rawson, Sr. trained with his father's firm before setting up his own shop. In 1808, he entered into a partnership with his son Samuel (1786-1852) and in 1826, the partnership was dissolved with Samuel continuing the business with his brother, Joseph Rawson, Jr. (1788-1870). While little is known of its history aside from its ownership by Francis D. Brinton at the time of its publication in 1931, the bureau was probably acquired by Joseph K. Ott soon before it appeared in his 1982 article in The Magazine Antiques, reflecting his particular focus on labeled furniture during the later phase of his collecting (Robert Rauschenberg and John Bivins, The Furniture of Charleston, 1680-1820: Volume III: The Cabinetmakers (Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 2003), pp. 1178-1181; The Rhode Island Furniture Archive at the Yale University Art Gallery, RIF1754, RIF1755, RIF4548 and RIF4655 and biographies of Joseph Rawson, Sr., Joseph Rawson & Son, Samuel Rawson and Joseph Rawson, Jr.; see also Eleanore Bradford Monahon, "The Rawson Family of Cabinetmakers in Providence, Rhode Island," The Magazine Antiques (July 1980), pp. 134-147; Joseph K. Ott, "Lesser-known Rhode Island Cabinetmakers: The Carliles, Holmes Weaver, Judson Blake, the Rawsons, and Thomas Davenport," The Magazine Antiques (May 1982), pp. 1159-1162, figs. 7, 9, pl. IV).