Dark green paint decorated miniature chest, Jacob Weber (1802-?), Brecknock Township, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, dated 1849

Inscribed on front 1849 Lydia Kinzy.

Howard and Jean Lipman, Wilton, Connecticut
Sotheby Parke-Bernet, "The Howard and Jean Lipman Collection of Important American Folk Art & Painted Furniture," November 14, 1981, lot 20

American Radiance: The Ralph Esmerian Gift to the American Folk Art Museum, p. 175, fig. 143

Touch-up to scrape on left side, otherwise in very good condition and paint appears untouched under blacklight.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

This small decorated box relates to a known group of similarly decorated and constructed examples, all with Lancaster histories of ownership. Their attribution to the Lancaster Valley craftsman Jacob Weber is based upon early research and genealogical information gathered by Nina Fletcher Little and is further substantiated by two surviving examples that are signed "J W" in script on the underside of their bottom boards.¹All these known examples are similarly constructed of thinly sawn or rived white pine, with side panels inset, rabbeted, and pinned into the front and back panels. Edge-molded bottom boards are pinned up into the underedges of the box's sides. Small, solidly carved bracket-form feet or, in some examples, slightly flaring, neoclassically inspired "French feet" are pinned up into these bottom boards at their corners. The tops of all examples are attached to the backboard of the lower case with thin wire cotter-pin hinges. The outer edges of their tops are decorated with a thinly incised, planed, or "quirked" beaded edge. On most examples, an oversize sheet-tin hasp is attached at the center of the front edge of the top, which hinges downward to engage a wire loop set into the front board of the box to accommodate the seating of a separate hanging or "pad" -type locking mechanism.

The painted decoration on this example is typical of the known group associated with Weber. The ground colors are laid down directly on the unprimed wood surface and are thinly applied, ranging from the blue-green of this box to lighter blue, light green, or yellow.² Over this ground color is painted the figural decoration. On all known examples, the pattern on the front of the box contains a multiwindowed, Georgian-style, two- or three-story house, complete with side chimneys, story watercourses, and mullioned sashes and transoms. These houses are symmetrically placed and carefully rendered in three dimensions, flanked by a pair of manicured trees in full leaf. This ordered landscape is centered in a gentle, rolling foreground of low hills, painted in thin washes of greens and browns. The side and top panels of this box, like most examples from the group, are decorated with centrally composed, freehand-painted tulips whose leaves and vines are executed in two or three color layers and framed with fans or arches defining the box corners.

It is not known whether the different houses depicted on these boxes were merely Weber's artistic vision or if he painted the particular houses in which his patrons lived. Few examples depict the type of vernacular Georgian architectural detail, such a pent roofs, twin-front facade doors, or arched shed doorways, that was commonly utilized on houses built within the wealthier Lancaster Germanic farming community at midcentury. Interestingly, one pair of boxes, made for sisters Catherine and Hannah Landes and dated 1849, is decorated with identical structures, and may either depict the house in which they lived or simply have been envisioned and painted by Weber to create a closely matched pair of boxes for presentation to the siblings.³ -J.L.L.

¹ Research by the Lancaster Heritage Center, Lancaster, Pa., suggests the boxes are the work of Jonas Weber (1810-1876) (AFAM files).
² These ground colors often oxidize to darker colors, appearing black in this case rather than the brighter blue-green original hue that is evident where it has been exposed at points of abrasion and wear.
³ These boxes are recorded in the Decorative Arts Photographic Collections at Winterthur (see Weber file). One is in a private Philadelphia-area collection, and the other is in the PMA collection; see Jacob Weber research file, American Department, PMA.