Of the Earth: Neoclassicism and Natural History in a Philadelphia Center Table By Steven Baltsas
A center table new to the Winterthur collection is somewhat of an enigma. Characteristic of American classical furniture in the 1820s and 30s, it is curvaceous and theatrical, altered with its hinged top (figs. 1, 2) . Light dances across its radiating mahogany veneer, encircled by flowers and vines rendered with
Fig. 1. Center table, Philadelphia, 1825–30. Gift of Sue K. and Stuart P. Feld 2018.0046.001
inlaid brass. The table’s composition represents an interest in the ancient and natural worlds, being a synthesis of those forces that had bewitched antebellum Philadelphia—its likely place of origin. Its maker can only be tantalizingly surmised. Design sources suggest the table was made for occasional dining or card games. Tables marketed to fulfill those purposes typically tilted upwards to allow for storage against a wall. Hiding its metamorphic abilities, the table’s supports, carved with classical reeding and foliage, convey a sense of grounding. Close inspection reveals their original color scheme: vert antique , a paint treatment used to simulate the patina on Greco-Roman bronze sculpture. Mimicking metal, the supports seem as substantial as those on equally popular marble-topped center tables. Perfect examples of such marble-topped tables are those made by Philadelphia cabinetmaker Anthony G. Quervelle for Edward Coleman in the 1820s. 1 With inlaid Italian marble tops, legs with robust lion’s paw feet, and a mahogany veneered star forming its thick base, they were clearly not designed to move often. Therein lay the challenge. These alluring marble tops could not be tilted lest they topple over with their weight. How could a maker match the eccentricity and dominance of such tables but also sustain the long-enjoyed utility of the tilt-top form? Rounded tilt-top tables made in Philadelphia during the eighteenth century often flaunted the natural grain of mahogany. By the 1790s,
1 In the Baltimore Museum of Art (1990.73) and the Kaufman Collection, National Gallery of Art.
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