Folding stool

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This stool was originally intended to be used by a wealthy congregant of Saint Mary’s Church in Gdask, Poland, as a comfortable seat during Mass. Designed to be beautiful and portable, this stool is also personalized: in addition to the delicate intarsia showing birds and vines that symbolize the union of believers with Christ, the costly stretchers are coarsely incised with the initials “DS” and “IS.”

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art