A Set of Six Chinese Export Rosewood Dining Chairs Circa 1740

the backs with arched curved crest rails continuing to waisted uprights, above a shaped splat pierced below the crest and with an arched piercing at the base, the surfaces carved overall in low relief with sinuous leaves and tendrils, the balloon-shaped drop-in seat within a similarly carved conforming seat rail, the cabriole legs carved with scrolls and foliage, the stylized hoof feet carved dragons’ heads above pad toes.

Christie’s, New York, anonymous sale, October 17, 1981, lot 198

This set of chairs would originally have been commissioned by a Western merchant, possibly in Canton or another trading center such as Batavia, for export to Europe. A number of other chairs of this design are recorded, together with several others also based on contemporary English models. These include two designs with ‘bended backs’, one with a vase-form splat and shell carved cabriole legs with paw feet (De Cordova Museum catalogue, op. cit., p. 21), and another which is similarly carved overall in low relief as in the present chairs, its cabriole legs with stylized fan ornament on the knees, the pad feet with grotesque masks (Gilbert, op. cit., p. 493). The former chair is incised on the seat rail with the Roman numeral VII, the latter with the figure 12 indicating that they are from larger sets. The highly enriched carved surfaces of the present set and that of the single example at Temple Newsam clearly owes their origin to the carved gilt-gesso surfaces found on English furniture dating from the late Queen Anne and George I period. This is particularly noticeable on the Temple Newsam chair, the uprights being carved with panels of strapwork enclosing flowerheads and husks. As with this example, the feet of the present set are carved with masks, the trailing foliage being of a more pronounced Chinese character. The profile of all these chairs undoubtedly betray their European origins, their designer having an intimate knowledge of contemporary English forms, although the craftsmanship is clearly oriental. No exact English parallel has been found for the present set but in some ways their backs have a certain affinity to the ‘shell-back’ chairs attributed to Giles Grendey, a pair of which is included in this sale (lot 497).  An exact parallel can, however, be drawn between a set of unprovenanced English George I walnut chairs (Lennox-Boyd, op. cit., p. 80, figs. 58, 59) and a set of Chinese rosewood chairs, both of these are of identical design with vase-form splats with foliate carving, and cabriole legs carved at the knees with lion masks and with paw feet. Their differences in construction and timbers used indicate their countries of origin, as does the slightly heavier and more solid profile of the Chinese example. Either the English model or the Chinese model is shown in a painting by William Verelst of The Gough Family, 1741, who are seated in a fashionable interior with chairs of this pattern (Lennox-Boyd, op. cit., fig. 60). Sir Henry Gough had acquired much of his wealth trading in the East, allowing one to speculate that he was responsible for having copies of his own chairs made by Chinese artisans in one of the trading ports.    

Several other identical sets identical to the present lot are recorded including a set of fifteen (Christie’s, op. cit.), and a set  in the collection of the Marquess of Salisbury at Hatfield House (Hatfield House, op. cit., p. 23). Now in The Winter Dining Room, the set appears to number at least eleven which includes an armchair with the characteristic Chinese curved supports at the center of the arms.

See:

The Antique Collector, October 1956, ‘The chair with a Shell Back’, R. W. Symonds, pp. 117-182

Christie’s, London, sale May 20, 1971, a set of fifteen identical chairs

Christie’s, Review of the year 1970-1971, 1971, the above set of fifteen illustrated

Hatfield House, Guide Book, 1978.

Christopher Gilbert, Furniture at Temple Newsam House and Lotherton Hall, 1978, pp. 492-493, item 648

De Cordova Museum, Lincoln, Massachusetts, Exhibition Catalogue, June 22 – September 16, 1979, p. 25, a single chair in the Collection of the Museum of the American China Trade

Carl Crossman, The Decorative Arts of the China Trade, 1991, p. 231, pl. 83

The Magazine Antiques, February 1992, 'Chinese Export Furniture', Carl L. Crossman, pp. 333-343, pls. VII, IX, X

Exhibition  Catalogue,  Tale of Three Cities – Canton, Shanghai & Hong Kong, David S. Howard, Sotheby’s, London, 1997, p. 168, no. 218, two similar chairs from a set of twelve

Edward Lennox-Boyd, Masterpieces of English Furniture, The Gerstenfeld Collection, 1998