Articles
Posted 04/09/09
Portrait miniatures in the New Republic
April 2009 | In the decades since the 1740s American portrait miniatures had changed little. They were small, dark, and resembled provincial British works, which, indeed, they were.
Posted 04/09/09
History in towns: Madison, Georgia
April 2009 | The town of Madison, in Morgan County, Georgia, was lauded in 1849 by the historian George White (1802-1887). "There are as many well educated gentlemen and ladies in Madison as in any portion of the State," he wrote. "Many of the citizens are wealthy, and live in much style..."
Posted 04/02/09
What modern was: Mid Century masters of luxury
May 2008 | "Whatever is new, is bad,” Wallace Nutting wrote in 1925. A minister-turned-entrepreneur who almost single-handedly popularized the colonial revival style via the sale of period furniture reproductions, Nutting (1861–1941) was one of the most acerbic partisans in an aesthetic fight waged in the early decades of the twentieth century—a battle between modernism and tradition.
Posted 04/02/09
May 2008 | The craftsmen and the carved furniture of the Rappahannock River valley, 1740–1780
Posted 04/02/09
The Butterfly Man of New Orleans
May 2008 | Local collectors have come to know the anonymous maker as the “Butterfly Man” for his signature use of the double dovetail—a bowtie-shaped interior patch also known as a butterfly or flying Dutchman—to strengthen the glued panels that comprise the side walls (see Fig. 11).5 This common reinforcement method has not been found on any other armoires made in Louisiana.
