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Chair

A work made of mahogany, ebony, beech, and leather upholstery.
CC0 Public Domain Designation

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  • A work made of mahogany, ebony, beech, and leather upholstery.

Date:

1802/10

Artist:

After a design published by Thomas Hope
English, born Netherlands, 1769–1831
England

About this artwork

When Thomas Hope published his book Household Furniture and Interior Decoration in 1807, his name became forever associated with Neoclassicalism. Hope was a connoisseur and collector from a wealthy banking family of Scottish origin that moved from Amsterdam to London after the French Revolution. As a young man, he traveled extensively throughout Europe, Turkey, Syria, and Egypt, acquiring objects from all of these places, and incorporating elements from them in his design work. Hope’s wish was to shape the taste of his time by commissioning cabinetmakers to produce objects, most of which he designed himself, for display in his London home. His mansion on Duchess Street became a showplace visited by art lovers and professional architects who took inspiration from his work.

Of all the forms illustrated in Hope’s influential book, seating received the most attention. This chair, originally intended for use in a room containing Classical vases, is based on the saber-legged klismos, an ancient Greek form. Its idiosyncratic profile, with the exaggerated concave/convex shapes of the vertical stiles, might well have been inspired by the chairs depicted on the pots that sat on the shelves directly above it.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Applied Arts of Europe

Artist

Thomas Hope (Maker)

Title

Chair

Place

England (Object made in)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1802–1810

Medium

Mahogany, ebony, beech, and leather upholstery

Dimensions

88.3 × 64.2 × 72.4 cm (34 3/4 × 25 1/4 × 28 1/2 in.)

Credit Line

Robert Allen Purchase, Mary Waller Langhorne Memorial, and John and Neville Bryan Funds

Reference Number

2009.127

IIIF Manifest  The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.

https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/199775/manifest.json

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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