Crafting Modernism: Masters of the American Studio Design Movement from the Pinnacle Art Collection
Crafting Modernism: Masters of the American Studio Design Movement from the Pinnacle Art Collection
Wharton Esherick
Spiral Staircase from the Michael Watson House, Pittsford, New York
Auction Closed
June 10, 03:47 PM GMT
Estimate
100,000 - 150,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Wharton Esherick
Spiral Staircase from the Michael Watson House, Pittsford, New York
1963
oak
monogrammed WE and dated MCMLXIII
126 in. (320 cm) high as pictured
86 in. (218.4 cm) diameter
Michael Watson, Pittsford, New York, commissioned directly from the artist, 1963
R & Company, New York
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 2012
R & Company, New York
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 2012
Architectural Forum 73, no. 1, July 1940, p. 36 (for a period photograph of a related example exhibited at the New York World's Fair, 1940)
Craft Horizons, vol. 24, no. 3, May-June 1964, p. 92 (for a related example)
"The New American Craftsman: First Generation," Craft Horizons, vol. 26, no. 3, June 1966, p. 18 (for a related example)
Lee Nordness, Objects: USA, New York, 1970, p. 252 (for a related example)
The Wharton Esherick Museum Studio and Collection, Paoli, PA, 1984, p. 10 (for a period photograph of a related example exhibited at the New York World's fair, 1940)
Michael A. Stone, Contemporary American Woodworkers, Salt Lake City, 1986, pp. 6-7 (for a related example in Wharton Esherick's studio, Paoli, PA)
Patricia Conway, Art for Everyday: The New Craft Movement, New York, 1990, p. 19 (for the above mentioned related example)
Wharton Esherick 1887-1970: American Woodworker, exh. cat., Moderne Gallery, Philadelphia, 1996, p. 9 (for a period photograph of the present lot illustrated, 1964)
Edward S. Cooke, Jr., Gerald W. R. Ward, and Kelly H. L'Ecuyer, The Maker's Hand: American Studio Furniture 1940-1990, Boston, 2003, p. 23 (for the above mentioned period photograph)
Paul Eisenhauer and Lynne Farrington, eds., Wharton Esherick and the Birth of the American Modern, exh. cat., University of Pennsylvania, Atglen, PA, 2010, pp. 38, 139, 144 and 159 (for period photographs of the staircase in Wharton Esherick's studio and exhibited at the New York World's Fair, 1940)
Mansfield Bascom, Wharton Esherick: The Journey of a Creative Mind, New York, 2010, front cover and pp. 114, 115, 168 (for a drawing and period photographs of related examples) and 238 (for period photographs of the present lot illustrated)
Craft Horizons, vol. 24, no. 3, May-June 1964, p. 92 (for a related example)
"The New American Craftsman: First Generation," Craft Horizons, vol. 26, no. 3, June 1966, p. 18 (for a related example)
Lee Nordness, Objects: USA, New York, 1970, p. 252 (for a related example)
The Wharton Esherick Museum Studio and Collection, Paoli, PA, 1984, p. 10 (for a period photograph of a related example exhibited at the New York World's fair, 1940)
Michael A. Stone, Contemporary American Woodworkers, Salt Lake City, 1986, pp. 6-7 (for a related example in Wharton Esherick's studio, Paoli, PA)
Patricia Conway, Art for Everyday: The New Craft Movement, New York, 1990, p. 19 (for the above mentioned related example)
Wharton Esherick 1887-1970: American Woodworker, exh. cat., Moderne Gallery, Philadelphia, 1996, p. 9 (for a period photograph of the present lot illustrated, 1964)
Edward S. Cooke, Jr., Gerald W. R. Ward, and Kelly H. L'Ecuyer, The Maker's Hand: American Studio Furniture 1940-1990, Boston, 2003, p. 23 (for the above mentioned period photograph)
Paul Eisenhauer and Lynne Farrington, eds., Wharton Esherick and the Birth of the American Modern, exh. cat., University of Pennsylvania, Atglen, PA, 2010, pp. 38, 139, 144 and 159 (for period photographs of the staircase in Wharton Esherick's studio and exhibited at the New York World's Fair, 1940)
Mansfield Bascom, Wharton Esherick: The Journey of a Creative Mind, New York, 2010, front cover and pp. 114, 115, 168 (for a drawing and period photographs of related examples) and 238 (for period photographs of the present lot illustrated)
Wharton Esherick’s helical staircases are the DNA of studio furniture: a piece of source code, in which the whole subsequent trajectory of the field seems contained. It’s not an accident that when Wendell Castle, in the culminating years of his own long career, included a spiral staircase in his great installation artwork, A New Environment (2013, also in the Pinnacle Collection). He was looking back to his own beginnings. When he began exploring the intersection between furniture and sculpture, and looked around for recent precedents, there was really only one man standing there. “I'd never heard of anybody or knew of anybody who made furniture of a very unusual nature and actually made a living at it, and it was their life,” Castle said of Esherick. “And he'd made an environment for himself that was a sculpture, even. He practically lived in a sculpture.”1
He did indeed. And a great spiral staircase of red oak, which he’d made in 1930, stood at the heart of it. As many have noted, the stair – which remains the centerpiece of the Wharton Esherick Museum – captures the essence of the trees from which it was made, its torqued form literally branching out into cantilevered steps. Drawers inset at angles into the twisted central post describe a second spiral of voids, unseen within. It helped to make Esherick famous, when it was temporarily removed for display in a model room evoking a “Pennsylvania Hill House,” designed as a setting for his work by architect George Howe, at the 1939-1940 New York World’s Fair.
Over the course of his subsequent career, Esherick explored many and varied approaches to form, but curvature remained a constant. In 1959, Craft Horizons recorded a fragment of conversation he had with Louis Kahn, who contributed to the design of Esherick’s 1956 studio building. “You architects with your T squares and your triangles,” Esherick said during their exchange. “An artist wants curves, colors. Architecture must permit the chance of shadows through curves.”2 He was, as ever, expressing the all-importance of the experiential dimension. He stood for the triumph of subtlety over absolutism, evolution over stasis.
Given all this, it’s no surprise that Esherick would return to the spiral stair form, and see what more it could do. This iteration of the design, made when he was 76 years old, was part of his last major commission – the home of Michael and Nicola Watson, of Pittsford, just outside of Rochester (where Wendell Castle was based, as it happens).3 They, too, had the chance to live in a sculpture, immersed in the ever-widening spiral of Esherick’s creativity.
[1] Oral history interview with Wendell Castle, June 3 and December 12, 1981. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
[2] Quoted in Gertrude Benson, “Wharton Esherick,” Craft Horizons 19/1 (January/February 1959), 37.
[3] Michael’s father, James Sibley Watson, Jr., was the publisher of The Dial, America’s leading journal of literary modernism – a connection to Esherick’s own avant garde milieu. The Pittsford home also incorporated tiles by their friend, the ceramist Frans Wildenhain.
GLENN ADAMSON
He did indeed. And a great spiral staircase of red oak, which he’d made in 1930, stood at the heart of it. As many have noted, the stair – which remains the centerpiece of the Wharton Esherick Museum – captures the essence of the trees from which it was made, its torqued form literally branching out into cantilevered steps. Drawers inset at angles into the twisted central post describe a second spiral of voids, unseen within. It helped to make Esherick famous, when it was temporarily removed for display in a model room evoking a “Pennsylvania Hill House,” designed as a setting for his work by architect George Howe, at the 1939-1940 New York World’s Fair.
Over the course of his subsequent career, Esherick explored many and varied approaches to form, but curvature remained a constant. In 1959, Craft Horizons recorded a fragment of conversation he had with Louis Kahn, who contributed to the design of Esherick’s 1956 studio building. “You architects with your T squares and your triangles,” Esherick said during their exchange. “An artist wants curves, colors. Architecture must permit the chance of shadows through curves.”2 He was, as ever, expressing the all-importance of the experiential dimension. He stood for the triumph of subtlety over absolutism, evolution over stasis.
Given all this, it’s no surprise that Esherick would return to the spiral stair form, and see what more it could do. This iteration of the design, made when he was 76 years old, was part of his last major commission – the home of Michael and Nicola Watson, of Pittsford, just outside of Rochester (where Wendell Castle was based, as it happens).3 They, too, had the chance to live in a sculpture, immersed in the ever-widening spiral of Esherick’s creativity.
[1] Oral history interview with Wendell Castle, June 3 and December 12, 1981. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
[2] Quoted in Gertrude Benson, “Wharton Esherick,” Craft Horizons 19/1 (January/February 1959), 37.
[3] Michael’s father, James Sibley Watson, Jr., was the publisher of The Dial, America’s leading journal of literary modernism – a connection to Esherick’s own avant garde milieu. The Pittsford home also incorporated tiles by their friend, the ceramist Frans Wildenhain.
GLENN ADAMSON