Windsor Chair 1936

Dana Bartlett painted this Windsor Chair, with what looks like watercolor on paper. The chair itself speaks to histories of craft and design, and the American project of industrialization. But let’s linger on the fact that Bartlett chose to paint it. What does it mean to make an image of a functional object? Is it about elevating the everyday to the level of art? Perhaps it's about preserving a cultural memory. Windsor chairs, with their humble yet elegant design, evoke a sense of domesticity, of home. Yet they were also mass-produced, becoming a staple in homes across different social strata. Bartlett's artistic eye invites us to contemplate the intersection of utility and aesthetics, the stories objects tell, and the labor and lives woven into the making of our material world. It is about finding beauty in the mundane, and acknowledging the complex histories embedded in the objects that surround us.