The American Wing at The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Davidson, Marshall B., and Elizabeth Stillinger (1985)

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With 524 plates, 251 in full color The American Wing of the Metropolitan Museum is the home of America's most important and wide-ranging collection of the painting, sculpture, and decorative arts that have flourished in this country since our earliest days. Now for the first time the treasures of the collection are presented in a book that encompasses and celebrates the richness of our visual heritage.

Here, brilliantly photographed and discussed, are: Seventeen of the famous period rooms, authentic settings that give us a vivid sense of the changing styles of American life, from the Hart Room—the hall of a house built in Ipswich, Massachusetts, before 1674—to the living room of the Little house, a Minneapolis residence completed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1914.

Furniture of four centuries—an enormous variety of forms and designs at once functional and decorative, from the cupboards, chests, and chairs carved by anonymous seventeenth-century artisans, through the pre-Revolutionary styles of Queen Anne and Chippendale ... the graceful Sheraton, Hepplewhite, and Duncan Phyfe pieces produced during the Federal era ... New England timepieces ... Shaker and folk-art furniture ... examples of the Greek Revival of the mid-nineteenth century and the Rococo, Gothic, and other revivals that followed... to the innovative designs of Stickley, Wright, and Tiffany.

Lamps, dishes, vessels, and ornamental pieces wrought of many different materials: stoneware; Rookwood and other pottery; porcelain; silver, including the work of Paul Revere; pewter; and glass from the studios of L. C. Tiffany and other masters.

Paintings, prints, drawings, and watercolors, from the naive masterpieces of itinerant portraitists to the great canvases of West, Copley, Stuart, and the Peales ... the romantic vistas of Cole, Inness, Church, and Heade ... the vastly popular prints of Currier and Ives ... the individualistic visions of Homer, Whistler, Eakins, and Sargent ... and works by such twentieth-century figures as Sloan, Glackens, and Davies.

Throughout the book, the informative text provides discussions of the artists and craftsmen represented, together with historical, social, and aesthetic commentaries that further enrich this magnificent panorama of the arts Americans have lived with since our beginnings.

Table of contents

Foreword
John K. Howat

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Charles Engelhard Court

Period Rooms

The Early Colonial Period, 1630–1730

Hart Room
Wentworth Room
Hewlett Room

The Late Colonial Period, 1730–90

Aimodington Room
Powel Room
Van Rensselaer Hall
Verplanck Room
Marmion Room

The Federal Period, 1790–1820

Haverhill Room
Baltimore Room
Richmond Room
The Shaker Vernacular

The Pre-Civil War Period

The Greek Revival, 1820–45
The Rococo Revival, 1840–60
The Gothic Revival, 1830–75

The Post-Civil War Period

The Renaissance Revival, 1860–80
The Twentieth Century

Furniture

The Early Colonial Period, 1630–1730

The Late Colonial Period, 1730–90

The Federal and Early Empire Periods 1790–1820

The Shaker Vernacular
Windsors
Folk Art

The Pre-Civil War Period

The Greek Revival, 1820–45
The Rococo Revival, 1840–60
The Gothic Revival, 1830–75

The Post-Civil War Period

Renaissance, Egyptian, and Related Revivals, 1860–80
Innovative Furniture Reform Styles, 1875–1915

Silver

The Colonial Period, 1630–1790

The Federal Period, 1790–1830

The Pre-Centennial Period, 1830–75

The Post-Centennial Period, 1875–1915

Pewter

Ceramics

The Colonial and Federal Periods, 1630–1830

The Pre-Centennial Period, 1830–75

The Post-Centennial Period, 1875–1915

Glass

The Colonial and Federal Periods, 1630–1830

The Pre-Centennial Period, 1830–75

The Post-Centennial Period, 1875–1915

Paintings, Prints, Drawings, and Watercolors

The Colonial Period, 1630–1790

The Revolutionary Period, 1770–90

Miniatures

The Early Nineteenth Century, 1790–1840

The Mid-Nineteenth Century, 1840–65

The Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, 1865–1915

Sculpture

The Colonial and Federal Periods, 1630–1830

The Mid-Nineteenth Century, 1840–65

The Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, 1865–1915

Selected Bibliography

Index

About the authors

Marshall Davidson, a former curator of The American Wing, is the author of The Drawing of America, New York: A Pictorial History and several other books.

Elizabeth Stillinger is the author of The Antiques Guide to Decorative Arts in America, 1600–1875 and The Antiquers.

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Authors: Elizabeth Stillinger | Marshall B. Davidson

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