Side Chair 1660 - 1700

Curator: Well, what strikes me right away about this Side Chair, made somewhere between 1660 and 1700, is its air of sturdy simplicity. It feels…grounded. Editor: Grounded, yes, I see that. It's utterly unpretentious. The joinery speaks volumes, doesn't it? Each part related, nothing extraneous. Curator: Absolutely! Someone chose function over flourish, clearly. But there's still this quiet elegance in the repetition of the spindles in the backrest and the careful shaping of the legs, a thoughtful, simple design. Editor: Think of the lives it witnessed. Crafted from wood by an anonymous maker. I see semiotic markers— the four legs as representative of support, structure; the seat itself as a plane for activity. Curator: See, I immediately drift to imagining the folks who sat on it— what they wore, what they talked about, how much they must have appreciated having a place to rest their weary bones after a long day, don't you? I mean this was at time of kings and queens, and everyday living side chairs probably looked much like this piece. Editor: A very different world. Notice, too, the economy of line. The chair creates verticals and horizontals; it adheres to Euclidean principles with a deceptive nonchalance. Each member locks and stays within its station. It’s a pure thing! Curator: I guess, in its pure form, it offers up space for us to fill it up with our imaginings, our questions...it could be called simple, I prefer honest, that it doesn't need fancy bits to tell a good story. Editor: And from a formalist angle, it presents as a resolved composition within a plane—all wood and angles. Its visual austerity invites you to appreciate these basic tenets—what it means to *make* a functional thing from start to finish. It serves. Curator: Okay, fine... and yes it’s incredibly rewarding just picturing people leaning back on the same chair 300 years before now. I guess the joy’s in the both of our perspectives melding together in our imagination about the same basic Side Chair.