Armchair c. 1936

Curator: Immediately, I get a sense of austere comfort from this drawing. The artist has rendered an armchair in careful detail using watercolor and drawing techniques on paper. It dates to around 1936. Editor: The high back is striking. All those vertical lines, those slender spindles, point upwards like aspirations. The pale wooden color evokes humility and groundedness at once. Curator: What's particularly fascinating is that it’s clearly a representation of vernacular design. You see these kinds of chairs referenced throughout the American art and design of the early to mid-20th century. Artists and designers really mined a usable past for inspiration. The Depression era brought new appreciation of the virtues of functionality and honesty, I suppose. Editor: That heart cut into the top is everything though! It injects personality into what might otherwise be an entirely practical object. That tiny detail transforms the chair into something more than just a seat, into a symbol of welcome, warmth, maybe even familial love. Curator: I'd argue this type of vernacular object representation had great importance in museum acquisitions and exhibition-making policies of the 1930s. The presentation of such imagery helped establish national identity markers at the time. Folk art acquired value but so did depictions of useful, functional objects. Editor: And that seat, that woven rush... think about what it represents in terms of the past. Handwork, slow and careful construction. Even now, that particular weave calls up so many cultural memories: home, hearth, even the countryside and nostalgia. Curator: Right! Representations of functional and quaint objects were important tools to navigate anxieties, especially in this period of social and economic volatility in American history. Editor: I see it! From an iconographic perspective, an image of a simple, yet carefully constructed, chair invites contemplation on how something so ordinary can have such meaning. This object really invites us to sit down with history. Curator: Indeed! Well, a very interesting piece, and an insightful analysis!