Summer 2017

Banister-back chairs of this general type were a common form in the early baroque (or William and Mary) period in American furniture. Tall, stately, and with elegant turnings and robustly carved details, they were a staple of chair production throughout New England. This distinctive variant has been attributed to northeastern coastal Massachusetts and, as we are suggesting here, to Portsmouth. Its carving is related to that on a group of chairs, including a pair of side chairs in The Metropolitan Museum of Art and at least six other examples in private collections. The carved scrolls and foliage on the crest rails of these chairs bear markedly similar characteristics to carving on at least two other pieces of Portsmouth furniture: an altar table (St. John’s Church) and a dressing table (private collection), both attributed to the cabinetmaker Joseph Davis (w. 1726–1762). The maple crest rail of this chair, as yet the only known armchair in this group, is masterfully carved and displays evidence at the back of having been riven. The crest here displays a high degree of development—it is surmounted by a foliage-carved broken scroll pediment, while the side chairs have a large C-scroll at the top. Each member of the group, however, has identical notching on all the large scrolls. They all also display leafage at the center, with opposing outward-curling leaves on each side of a central drop, and all are adorned with carved veining. This formula is also seen on the aforementioned altar table and dressing table. In addition, these chairs have double-ball turned side stretchers, a vernacular feature now generally also accepted as part of the design of more formal chairs produced in this area. The result is a tribute to the elegance that defined Portsmouth’s English-based aesthetic since the beginning of the eighteenth century. Fig. 1: Banister-back armchair with carved crest, possibly Portsmouth, 1725–1735. Maple, ash. H. 45, W. 25, D. 17 in. Private collection. Photo by Ralph Morang. Summer 124 www.afamag.com | w ww.incollect.com