18th century AD

Magazine Antiques, May, 1994 by Michael S. Podmaniczky, Philip D. Zimmerman

Another dimension of its value is what we may infer of its history. What did the three carved figures signify to Joseph Barrell? Put aside for a time, perhaps as much in deference to changing fashions as to its physical deterioration, the desk-and-bookcase was nonetheless lovingly restored as a link to the past, although the restoration was based on different standards than ours.

More recently, the desk-and-bookcase has not lost its ability to fire imaginations, even though its appearance was, in the words of Barrell's motto (see Fig. 3), NOT ALWAYS SO. (1) Du Pont bought the desk-and-bookcase as lot 277 in the George & Palmer Collection (Anderson Galleries, New York, 1928) on October 18. It was the frontispiece of the catalogue, where it was described as a "Rhode Island Mahogany Kettle Bottom Secretary," probably made in Newport. The piece was featured prominently in Aaron Marc Stein's "French Influences in American Furniture," The Antiquarian, vol. 17, no. 4 (October 1931), pp. 15-19. (2) Joseph Downs suggested that the bombe shape originated in seventeenth-century italy and spread with other baroque shapes throughout Europe (Antiques, April 1952, p. 324). For a more comprehensive discussion see Gilbert T. Vincent, "The Bombe Furniture of Boston," in Boston Furniture of the Eighteenth Century (Boston, 1974), pp. 137-196; and Antiques, May 1989, pp. 1178-1189. (3) This pulpit is discussed and illustrated in Peter Benes and Philip D. Zimmerman, New England Meeting House and Church, 1630-1850 (Boston University and Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, New Hampshire, 1979), pp. 39-4. (4) This is in the collection of the United States Department of State (see Treasures of State: Fine and Decorative Arts in the Diplomatic Reception Rooms of the U.S. Department of State, ed. Alexandra W. Rollins [New York, 1991], p. 94, No. 13). It is also illustrated in Antiques, May 1989, p. 1179, PL III. (5) In 1792 Joseph Barrell employed the neoclassical architect Charles Bulfinch (1763-1844) to design Pleasant Hill, his country seat in Charlestown, Massachusetts (now part of Boston). It incorporated several innovative elements and thus seemed the perfect setting for the desk-and-bookcase, as some scholars have remarked in lectures. For a discussion of the house see Harold Kirker, The Architecture of Charles Bulfinch (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1969), pp. 45-53. (6) American Furniture: The Federal Period in the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum (New York, 1966), p. 220, No. 176. (7) All four feet of the Brinley desk have been sawed off and reattached, although the left and right front feet may have been switched. (8) The Groton School in Groton, Massachusetts, owns a similar desk. We would like to acknowledge the help of Robert Mussey. He and Ann Haley are the authors of "John Cogswell and Boston Bombe Furniture: 35 Years of Revolution in Politics and Design," to be published m a forthcoming issue of American Furniture (the journal of the Chipstone Foundation, Milwaukee, Wisconsin). (9) The easiest way to fill such a cut is to glue in a strip of wood with the grain running from front to back (10) New drawers that exactly fit the profile of the drawers in the Brinley desk could have been copied from any of four sources: the desk itself, the original Barrell drawers, the original Barrell drawer blades, or the eighteenth-century templates from which all were originally made. (11) Early speculation that the desk was designed to stand alone and that the bookcase was a later addition ignored the pine top. (12) The poorly planned junction of the rabbeted side boards and unrabbeted top board, as well as other construction details, indicates that the rabbet for the backboards was cut much later than the assembly of the case, probably when the bookcase section was reduced in width. (13) See Gerald W. R. Ward, America Case Furniture in the Mabel Brady Garvan and Other Collections at Yale University (New Haven, 1988), pp. 171-177, No. 82. (14) For a discussion of the Skillins see Antiques, December 1931, pp. 340-343; and Sylvia Leistyna Lahvis, "Icons of American Trade: The Skillin Workshop and the Language of Spectacle," Winterthur Portfolio, vol. 27, no. 4 (Winter 1992), pp. 213-233. Harold Sack attributed the carved figures on the Barrell desk-and-bookcase to the Skillins in Antiques, May 1989, p. 1189, Pl. XIX (15) For useful comparisons see Lahvis, "Icons of American Trade," p. 213, Figs. 13, 14. Differences between the Barrell figures and the Skillins' work are noted in Wayne Craven, Sculpture in America New York 1968), p. 13. (16) The left-hand figure, probably Sloth, is more a caricature than an allegorical figure, supporting the rags-to-riches parable in the lower half of the bookplate. (17) The sickle blade held by the right-hand figure on the Barrell bookcase is a replacement. The undisturbed butt of the handle, however, matches the handle held by the light-hand figure in the bookplate and also suggests that the carved figure originally held something more substantial, perhaps resembling the object held by the corresponding figure in the bookplate.