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Antiques! => Antique Questions Forum => Topic started by: Gustos on May 31, 2014, 08:56:29 AM
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Hello everyone, I have a pair of chairs that I unfortunately know very little about. I am hoping to ask you all for some help figuring out what they are. They appear to be a his and hers set. They were found in a basement in New Jersey in the 1950's. They have been in my family since then. That's about all I know. Maybe after seeing some photos, somebody might recognize them. Thank you for any assistance and knowledge you can provide.
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Welcome and thank you for posting!
Can you tell if the seat has springs in it? Can you post a picture of the undersides of the pieces?
Beautiful. Trying to determine if late Victorian or a reproduction done in the depression era.
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They appear to be Victorian Renaissance Revival chairs. I personally have never seen them reproduced in the 30s but I have seen reproductions later. That does not mean there are none. I am sure there are. The patina on these looks good in the picture. I would like to know the answer to KCs question. They are also probably stuffed with horsehair. Unfortunately you can't check that without damaging them.
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You might try searching for “John Jelliff”; furniture maker from Newark, New Jersey. His shop was known for Renaissance Revival chairs of this type.
http://rarevictorian.com/shop/?site=John-Jelliff (http://rarevictorian.com/shop/?site=John-Jelliff)
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They are top quality. Have to be period chairs - maybe 1870-80 ?
Those wonderfully carved arms - very similar to those here ( same features, hair, swept neck, " tassle " at the front )
http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/5146547 (http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/5146547)
and again here
http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/2793423 (http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/2793423)
Rauville seems to have been spot on with Jelliff
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Rauville seems to have been spot on with Jelliff
No, I doubt if I was spot on, but I appreciate the support Ipcress. If you ever want to start a heated discussion, just announce that you have a “Jelliff chair”. Someone will say “No, that’s a Hamburger”; then someone will suggest “Maybe a Schrenkeisen?”. Since there has never been a signed piece of Jelliff furniture discovered (to my knowledge), the best one can say is “in the style of” or “attributed to”. But starting with reading about Jelliff is a good place to begin in my opinion.
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Not many have read about Jelliff !! Pretty sure these are not his, but one of the later ones !! Not really his way of styling a chair !! Did you have these chairs recovered ??
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Hello Everbody,
Thanks for all the responses, way to make a guy feel welcome! I'll send some more close ups and check for springs.
I seem to remember a photo of my grandfather with these chairs, possibly as they were found in the basement. I think my memory is them being un-upholstered. The house in Jersey was close to the shore line. It was this beautiful old Victorian with amazing interior wood carvings. I have old photos of the area after a hurricane hit. The water had at least filled the basement of the home. So that may explain the condition you'll see in the photos.
I don't know exactly what you mean by recovered?
Thanks again for all this great information.
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Rauville seems to have been spot on with Jelliff
No, I doubt if I was spot on, but I appreciate the support Ipcress. If you ever want to start a heated discussion, just announce that you have a “Jelliff chair”. Someone will say “No, that’s a Hamburger”; then someone will suggest “Maybe a Schrenkeisen?”. Since there has never been a signed piece of Jelliff furniture discovered (to my knowledge), the best one can say is “in the style of” or “attributed to”. But starting with reading about Jelliff is a good place to begin in my opinion.
Those arms are very distinctive and haven't seen them on furniture attributed to other designers.
Might be someone taught by Jelliff ( like " school of " with painters ) but i think it's safe to use his name when describing these
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A few more.
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The smaller of the two.
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Yeah, I am going with the "attributed to" or "in the style of" Jelliff. Rare Victorian did many threads on this maker over the years and, according to Ulysses Dietz at the Newark Museum, there are only 2 known signed pieces by Jelliff.
http://victorianforum.com/antique-furniture-attributions/furniture-attributed-to-john-jelliff/
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Beautiful. There's a walnutty look to them in a couple of the photos, although rosewood in others.
And even a cobweb for good measure !
Worth reading this page, where someone attempts to attribute the piece to Schrenkeisen
http://rarevictorian.com/2009/02/m-h-schrenkeisen-sofa-with-carved-bust-arms.html
Read the post by Ulysses Dietz.
This is the sofa in the Newark museum he speaks of
http://gallery.newarkmuseum.org/view/objects/asitem/Objects@3151905/3/title-desc;jsessionid=0FCE9998768ACD146A2742848D6878D3?t:state:flow=f7e18ec4-bc62-41af-8929-0407189ee720 (http://gallery.newarkmuseum.org/view/objects/asitem/Objects@3151905/3/title-desc;jsessionid=0FCE9998768ACD146A2742848D6878D3?t:state:flow=f7e18ec4-bc62-41af-8929-0407189ee720)
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Worth reading this page, where someone attempts to attribute the piece to Schrenkeisen
Yeah, This is what happens when cabinetmakers do not mark their work. What happens in the Jelliff case, every maker that has a female bust arm (Jenny Lind head) are attributed to Jelliff as a marketing tool whether it was built by Jelliff or not.
BTW, the "Jenny Lind" thing is bogus as well, no one really knows what or who the carved female head represents.
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Far more likely to be a generic female bust based on someone like Minerva than Jenny Lind.
On Victorian pennies you have the Queen herself on the obverse with Britannia on the reverse - the image was everywhere during the 19th century.
Strong, dominant, intelligent women...who weren't allowed to vote !
The Victorians made damn fine furniture, though.
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Right Jacon4 !! Just adding the name to the title means money for the seller !! And I did mean reupholstered,, "recovered" is a local term here in Texas !!
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Just adding the name to the title means money for the seller !
Yep, however, this works both ways. About a year ago, a carved pilgrim century chest (1620-1720) came on the market that a small southern auction house mis-attributed to the Mason-Messenger shop in Boston with an estimate of 1-3k. I immediately realized the carving was in fact, Thomas Dennis (america's most celebrated 17th century joiner). The chest was in poor condition, feet were missing, lid not original, etc. however, the 3 carved front panels were absolutely carved by DENNIS! in my mind. I confided this info to a friend who, after looking at pics of the chest had doubts, this was wrong, that was not correct, bla bla bla.
Then i did a stupid thing ( if i had any hope of acquiring the chest), I second guessed myself. I spent an entire day & night researching known Dennis carvings. At this point, i was 90% sure where the day before i was 100%. I fired off an email to someone who knew more and had actually handled more Dennis objects than anyone on the planet. He confirmed that yes, this is in fact a chest built by Thomas Dennis, the attribution is wrong! and, within 10 mins had a post on his blog with pics and everything! This had the effect of alerting every antiquarian in the nation and also dashed any hope i had of buying this chest under the radar so to speak. The chest sold for over 30k
Bottom Line? Sometimes the attribution can work to your advantage if you don't give the game away like i did.
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In this day and age ,,better keep what you know or suspect to yourself !! Go with your own gut instinct !! Sometimes you just have a feeling when something is right or wrong !!
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so sorry that happened Jacon4. Like Mart said, if you are interested...need to keep it to a close knit circle of TRUSTED friends/colleagues.
Love the responses this thread is getting.
Did you ever find out if there are springs. You can tell when you sit on it. You can usually feel the spring and/or hear them!
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That Rare Victorian website is interesting. Had a good read earlier whilst having a cup of tea and a slice of Cadbury's cake !
Bookmarked it.
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Yeah, Rare Victorian forum once upon a time had quite a bit of action (posters) but it has fallen on hard times. If you notice, some of the categories have not had a post in several years. Still, i use it now as a research tool through the search feature, i did today on this Jelliff thread.
KC, yeah well, what happened on dennis chest was entirely my fault, thats the way it goes though sometimes. The authority on dennis didnt do anything wrong, he was just so excited to discover another chest had been found. Push to hard and it can back fire on you, i pushed to hard!