A Very Rare Chippendale Serpentine-Front Lolling Chair, Boston, Massachusetts, Circa 1770

Israel Sack, Inc., New York.

Israel Sack, Inc. advertisement, Magazine Antiques, vol. 85, no. 5, May 1964, inside cover;

Israel Sack, Inc., American Antiques from Israel Sack Collection, Vol. 1, no. 660, p. 269;

Yale University Art Gallery, Israel Sack, Inc. Archive, no. 1154J.

With its tall upholstered back, acanthus carved knees, and claw and ball feet, this lolling chair is one of the few known high style example of its form. It is additionally rare for its small size and retains an old finish.

A related Chippendale period lolling chair also made in the Boston area sold in these rooms, Fine Americana, October 10, 1998, sale 7195, lot 184 and subsequently at Bonhams Skinner, Fine Americana: The Keane Collection, November 19, 2021, lot 49. It is of the same overall form but is taller and displays a serpentine crest and plain creased knees. Another related example from Boston with plain peaked knees and claw feet is in the collection of Winterthur Museum.¹ It was loaned by Henry Francis du Pont to the landmark exhibition sponsored by the National Council of Girl Scouts in 1929 and described in the accompanying catalogue as “a very rare and dignified example.”²

¹ See Nancy Richards and Nancy Goyne Evans, New England Furniture at Winterthur: Queen Anne and Chippendale Periods (Winterthur, DE: The Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, 1997): no. 96, p. 179

² National Council of Girl Scouts, Loan Exhibition of Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century Furniture and Glass (New York: By the council, 1929), cat. 605.