Four chairs by Abraham Roentgen
Carved walnut and walnut veneer, beech, olive wood, replaced upholstery and textile covers. The front legs curving outwards and terminating in scroll feet, supporting a curved, trapezoid seat. The aprons, knees and tablier finely moulded and carved with acanthus foliage. The open back with veneered central baluster and acanthus scrolls at the shoulders. In good, stable restored condition. H 103, seat depth 41 cm.
Neuwied, around 1750 - 60.
After completing his apprenticeship in his father's business, Abraham Roentgen began his time as a journeyman. In the early 1730s he first worked in the Netherlands in Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam, then in London from 1733 to 1738. There he came into contact with Count Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf, the founder of the Moravian Church. Roentgen joined the Moravian Church in 1738 and settled with his wife in the newly founded settlement of Herrnhaag near Büdingen. After the community moved to Neuwied, he was able, supported by the offer of freedom from guild and customs regulations, to build up a large workshop specialising in many aspects of cabinetmaking and to produce top-quality products that met high international standards.
We know of chairs by Abraham Roentgen that were produced directly for princely commissions, such as for Pommersfelden Castle or Neuwied. The frame design is based on the Dutch models with which Abraham Roentgen had become acquainted on his journeymen's travels. When he then set up his workshop, creating a first-class, high-quality products became his personal priority, a goal which was supported by his Moravian faith. He created a new level of quality for these kinds of pieces combining carved and veneered decor that would meet high aesthetic and functional standards. In the chairs presented here, the burlwood veneers are carefully arranged in the same way on all the central balusters, enhanced by identical carved details, so as to provide a uniform appearance. Roentgen's chairs appear more detailed and playful than contemporary Dutch examples, but he was serving a different audience. The demands of the German princely courts and the nobility of the Rhineland were influenced by the domestic furniture produced in small workshops in the region and above all by the style of the South German Rococo. Roentgen developed models in a new style for these circles, combining nods to tradition with numerous unique features that contributed to the successful marketing of his workshop.
Provenance
Formerly the collection of the Princes of Wied, Monrepos Palace. - Transferred to Neuwied Palace after its relinquishment in 1969.
- Privately owned in southern Germany since 1979.
Literature
Cf. Himmelheber, Zum Frühwerk Abraham Roentgen, in: Kunst und Antiquitäten 10/1992, p. 57 ff, fig. 7, for the same chair in the Historisches Museum Frankfurt.
Cf. Fabian, Abraham and David Roentgen. Das noch aufgefundenes Gesamtwerk ihrer Möbel- und Uhrenkunst in Verbindung mit der Uhrmacherfamilie Kinzing in Neuwied. Leben und Werk, Verzeichnis der Werke, Quellen, Bad Neustadt 1996, no. 476 f., for the chairs in Pommersfelden Castle.