The Important Francis P. Garvan Chippendale Carved and Figured Walnut Bonnet-Top High Chest of Drawers, Carving attributed to Nicholas Bernard (1732-1789), Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Circa 1755-1760

Francis Patrick Garvan (1875-1937), New York;

American Art Association-Anderson Galleries Inc., New York, Selections from the Collection of Francis P. Garvan: Furniture and Silver by American Master Craftsmen of Colonial and Early Federal Times, January 8-10, 1931, lot 396;

Israel Sack Inc., New York;

American Art Association-Anderson Galleries Inc., One Hundred Important Antiques: Colonial and Early Federal Furniture, Silver and Porcelains of Distinguished Provenance Acquired from Notable Collections by Israel Sack Sold by his Order, January 9, 1932, sale 3040, lot 67;

Private collection;

John S. Walton, Jewett City, Connecticut;

Dr. and Mrs. Henry C. Landon III, Wilmington, North Carolina;

Sotheby's, New York, The Property Of Dr. And Mrs. Henry C. Landon III, January 24, 2009, sale 8513, lot 92.

Wallace Nutting, Furniture Treasury, (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1928), no. 369;

American Art Galleries, Loan Exhibition of Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Furniture and Glass for the Benefit of the National Council of Girl Scouts, Inc., New York, 1929, pl. 651;

John S. Walton advertisement, Magazine Antiques (January 1968);

Magazine Antiques, "Living with Antiques in the South," (May 1975): pl. III and fig. 8;

Vicki Fama, et al, A Jeffersonian Ideal: Selections from the Dr. and Mrs. Henry C. Landon III Collection of American Fine and Decorative Arts, (Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Art Museum, 2005), pp. 86-7;

Art and Antiques Magazine (March 2006): 95.

A monumental statement of the Philadelphia Rococo aesthetic, this high chest of drawers displays exceptional carving attributed to Nicholas Bernard, an accomplished carver who was influenced and perhaps trained by Samuel Harding. In emphasizing the control of line over the sculpting of mass, the carving of this chest is indicative of his work of the mid to late 1750s, when his designs and techniques were well integrated and skillfully articulated. The knee carving consisting of bilaterally symmetrical leaves separated by a V-shaped dart rendered with intaglio lunettes appears on seating furniture, other case furniture, and tables attributed to Bernard.¹ The feet are typical of his work from the 1750s in which the claw and ball occupy the full thickness of the stock and are articulated in scale with the leg without a rear knuckle. Remarkably, this chest retains its original cartouche, which represents Bernard's most sculptural work and follows the pattern of those found on several other case pieces with carving attributed to him.²

Nicholas Bernard was executing carving of this pattern by November 15, 1753, the date inscribed on a high chest of drawers at Colonial Williamsburg with his carving and the signature of the Philadelphia cabinetmaker Henry Clifton.³ The latter has been identified as Nicholas Bernard's earliest dated work.⁴  Bernard apparently favored this pattern for he articulated it on a group of surviving Philadelphia casework, including a dressing table at Colonial Williamsburg made en suite with the aforementioned high chest, the Van Pelt dressing table that sold in these rooms, Important Americana, September 26, 2008, sale 8448, lot 9, a high chest illustrated by William M. Hornor in plate 182 of Blue Book Philadelphia Furniture as the property of Joseph Carson, Esq., a high chest with a history in the Biddle and Drinker families that sold at Christie's, New York, Important American Furniture, Folk Art, Maritime Art and Prints, September 24, 2008, lot 31, a chest-on-chest in the collection of the Historical Society of Dauphin County in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, a high chest and en suite dressing table in a private collection, and a dressing table with a history in the Biddle family that sold in these rooms, Fine Americana, January 28-31, 1994, sale 6527, lot 1280.⁵ A dressing table sold at Christie's, a high chest illustrated in The Old Furniture Book, and a dressing table at Mount Pleasant also exhibit carving of the same pattern that appears to be by the same hand.⁶

A dressing table made en suite with this high chest with carving attributed to Bernard survives in a private collection. It was formerly in the Garvan Collection and sold in 1931 at the American Art Association Anderson Galleries sale of Selections from the Collection of Francis P. Garvan, as lot 396. Like the present high chest, the dressing table was included in the Girl Scouts Loan exhibition of 1929 and illustrated by Wallace Nutting.⁷ It sold at Sotheby's, New York, Property From The Collection Of Josephine & Walter Buhl Ford II, October 6, 2006, sale 8267, lot 369.

¹ Luke Beckerdite and Alan Miller, "A Table's Tale: Craft, Art, and Opportunity in Eighteenth-Century Philadelphia," American Furniture, edited by Luke Beckerdite, (Hanover and London, 2004), figs. 18, 30, 31, pp. 11, 17, and 18.

² ibid, fig. 27, p. 15.

³ Morrison Heckscher and Leslie Greene Bowman, American Rococo, New York, 1992, fig. 47, p. 199.

⁴ Beckerdite and Miller, note 6, p. 42.

⁵ ibid, fig. 27, p. 15, and figs. 30-31, pp. 17-8.

⁶ Christie's, New York, Important American Furniture, Silver, Maritime, Folk Art and Outsider Art, September 19, 2017, sale 14970, lot 116 and N. Hudson Moore, The Old Furniture Book, (New York, 1936), fig. 64, p. 138. The dressing table at Mount Pleasant is in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

⁷ Wallace Nutting, Furniture Treasury, no. 369 and American Art Galleries, Girl Scouts Loan Exhibition, 1929, no. 651.