17th Century Furniture (part 25 of 31)

Cabinets
In its simplest form, a cabinet is a piece of handmade furniture with drawers or compartments for storage purposes.
Until the 17th century, collector's cabinets for precious items were owned only by the wealthy, and were only viewed by a select number of people in private rooms.
Dutch cabinets were also used for storing linen, and were important status symbols in the Low Countries.
As the century progressed, the cabinet became a grand piece of non fitted furniture that dominated a room, a showpiece both for the consummate skill of the cabinet maker, and for the exotic materials used, including ivory, amber, ebony, pietra dura, and exquisite marquetry panels. Cabinets from Augsburg, Antwerp, Naples, or the Orient were especially coveted.
There were many types of cabinet, now often reproduction furniture, - from Iberian varguenos, which were originally portable writing desks, to exotic Oriental pieces. Imported lacquer cabinets from the Far East were immensely fashionable. In England, carvers created ornate gilt stands to display the cabinets.
Still-life and floral paintings in the Dutch style were often reproduced in marquetry, and actual paintings were incorporated as panels on cabinets. Colonial pieces incorporated stylistic scenes from their native sources.

Cabinet-On-Stand
This oak veneered cabinet from Amsterdam is attributed to Jan van Mekeren. The exquisite marquetry panels are made from diverse imported woods, including kingwood, tulipwood, rosewood, ebony, olive wood, and holly, reflecting the naturalistic still-life paintings of flowers popular at the time.
The squared legs and flat stretchers of the stand are also decorated with floral marquetry.

 

This Cabinet-On-Stand from the Low Countries is made of oyster walnut and decorated with marquetry. It has a moulded cornice above panelled doors. The stand has a waved x-stretcher on spirally turned legs and ebonized bun feet.

An Export Lacquer Cabinet on European Giltwood Stand. Edo Period (early 17th century), the stand 17th-18th century of rectangular form, with two hinged doors opening to reveal various sized drawers surrounding a central drawer of architechtural form, all decorated in hiramaki-e and takamaki-e with a panel to the front depicting karashishi amongst rocks and pine trees, the edges of the doors with shippo-hanabishi, the reverse with a basket of flowers, the interior of the doors with a cockerel and hen, the drawers decorated with leaves and flowers including ginko, cherry blossom, plum, chrysanthemum, streams and butterflies on a black ground, copper gilt fittings engraved with tomoe mon and scrolling vines

A Queen Anne Black And Gilt Japanned Double-Dome Cabinet-On-Chest.
Decorated with figures, exotic birds, pagodas and foliage, with later finials above two doors enclosing drawers, with a later leather-lined brushing slide above two short and two long drawers, on later bracket feet.