Side Chair

John Townsend

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The subtle tilt of the chair back afforded minimal comfort while prompting the sitter to employ respectable posture. As mercantile wealth and social status increased in the colonial period, so did entertaining customs and the hierarchical distance between those perched in these chairs and those serving them. When entertaining subsided, chairs lined the edge of a room allowing the abstract wonderment of the skillfully sawn, puzzle-like back to enrich the interior design.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art