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Word of the Week: Mora

May 6, 2014 in Clocks, Word of the Week by hdavis

A Swedish polychromed tall case clock, mid 19th century, the circular face enameled and marked "A.A.L. Mora", the center section lyriform and raised on a shaped and paneled base to bracket feet.

The Mora clock originated in the town of Mora, a small village in Sweden that is just on the southern edge of the Scandinavian Mountains. The clocks are a style of tall-case clock with an eight-day movement and often with a bombe midsection. (The cases share a great deal stylistically with French clocks of the period.) They were produced for roughly a century, from the late 1700s to the late 1800s, as part of a cottage industry in the town of Mora, where families worked together to manufacture and assemble them with each household assuming responsibility for a particular part. The families actually just made the clock movements this way, with buyers commissioning cases from locals on an individual basis, which explains the consistency among movements yet the diversity among cases. It is estimated that the citizens of Mora and the surrounding area made more than 50,000 movements, as many as 1,000 per year during the heyday of manufacturing, but the glut of inexpensive clocks from manufacturing centers in Germany as well as in America killed production of clocks in Mora before the close of the 19th century.

Krang Anders Andersson (1727 to 1799) is considered the first clockmaker in the region with a 1792 dated clock movement bearing his initials and many Mora clocks are marked with those initials – A.A.S. Mora.

Word of the Week: Morse

April 14, 2014 in Silver, Word of the Week by hdavis

Gorham gem and micromosaic set gold-washed sterling silver morse, Providence, Rhode Island, 1899We live in a rather disposable era just now, with plastic buttons popping off in the laundry and pants with broken zippers being discarded, but in the past, the medieval past, luxury goods like fabric and closure accessories like buttons and clasps were difficult to come by. Their expensive nature meant they needed to be easily salvageable and clothing was designed with this in mind. Take for instance a cope, which is a long liturgical garment that is open in the front and originally had a cloth rectangular panel across the front that joined with hook and eye closures to keep the cope from slipping. These panels, known as morses, highly visible as they were on the breast of the wearer, came to be highly decorated, initially with elaborate embroidery and then later with gemstones sewn into the decorations. Naturally, as the wealth of the Church grew and as ceremonies and cathedrals became increasingly ornamented throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era, the morse became a metalwork piece, a wrought clasp.

They are quite rare, or perhaps it is simply rare to recognize them for what they are or for them to be identified as such at auction, as medieval examples are well documented, both in museums and in the documents of European churches. This example, which sold recently at Skinner, Inc., is identified by its inscription and was likely a gift in memory of a church member. The central portrait is a micromosaic, a image composed like a mosaic, but with near-microscopic pieces.

Grand Tour Souvenirs: Skinner Auctions, April 5

April 4, 2014 in Ancient Artifacts, Auctions & Events, Decorative Accessories by hdavis

Society’s traditions come and go, oftentimes for the better as our understanding of the world evolves, but I find it sad that one tradition in particular has faded away: that of the Grand Tour. While today we associate the idea of the Grand Tour with the late 19th century, in reality the custom began as early as the 17th century, rooted in the idea of religious pilgrim to Rome. In fact, it was during this time that travel began to be seen not just as a means to end, but as a worthwhile process in and of itself, as something done for pleasure, enrichment and intellectual curiosity.

At the same time, everything about travel was expensive and inconvenient. The process was lengthy and costly and one had to have not only the means to pay for the venture and accommodations, but also the ability to be gone for an extended period of time. Thus, as is so often the case when something is difficult and expensive, it will often gain cachet with the upper classes as a visible means of displaying wealth and privilege, and travel was no different as the Grand Tour experience flourished among the aristocracy of England and northern Europe.

While the Grand Tour was a very individualized experience, throughout the 18th century a generally accepted route was formalized, with English travelers crossing the English Channel from Dover, traveling to Paris, then to Switzerland, over the Alps into northern Italy, and then journeying south through Turin and Florence, tacking back and forth as much as possible to visit places like Bologna or Venice, before arriving in Rome. Some tourists would venture as far south as Naples and Pompeii, or as travel later improved, visitors sometimes went to Sicily or made tentative explorations around the Mediterranean, but usually from Rome or Naples, they turned north again, bearing west for the return trip across the Alps in order to visit the Germanic part of Europe: Vienna, Berlin, Munich – before looping back through Holland and crossing the Channel home.

The idea was that this experience would polish the skills a young man (later young women took the Grand Tour as well and the opportunity expanded beyond the aristocracy as rail travel presented a more affordable option) would need as an aristocrat and as one who would likely serve in some official capacity. Many traveled in the company of a tutor as well as entered into lessons along the way, with the expectation that they would return home with courtly manners, strong language skills, and an increased appreciation of world affairs, the history of western civilization, and cultural awareness.

Of course, as has ever been the case, tourists beget tourism, and travelers returned home with all manner of souvenirs: scale models of buildings, paintings and sculptures, ancient artifacts, trinkets decorated with European landscapes, objects designed to keep memories of their trip alive. A collection of such objects is being offered for sale at Skinner Auctions. Nearly 100 lots of terrific artifacts of dozens of Grand Tour trips including column models, paperweights, miniature landscapes, micromosaic scenes, and much more will be starting a new journey this weekend as they cross the auction block, so be sure to “take a tour” of the sale!

Word of the Week: Burl

March 19, 2014 in Crafts & Folk Art, Native American, Word of the Week by hdavis

An exceptional large ash burl covered bowl, North America, circa 1780.Burl wood is highly prized in the antiques world, used for veneer on a variety of case pieces and smaller decorative objects as well as being shaped into more utilitarian wares like bowls and utensils, but it starts life as one of those knobby, rounded growths often seen on trees. Most burl objects from an identified wood are ash, but burl can occur on just about any type of tree and objects are also made from maple, elm, and walnut burl, among others.

Burl is actually most typically a tree’s response to an injury of some sort – either a direct injury like a cut or a blow or an indirect one caused by the introduction of a virus or a fungus, and a great many of them are actually found in root systems in enormous connected networks when trees fall over. The knots within the burl themselves are dormant, malformed buds.

Extracting wood from a burl or using one to create an object is quite difficult, making burl not only prized for its rarity but for the difficulty in working with it. It is almost like a tumor – a dense cluster of cells and while the winding, convoluted grain makes it prone to cracking if worked with too much mechanical force, the same thickness of grain makes objects wrought from it unlikely to crack or split. Burl was often worked by hand, especially by Native Americans who created many utensils from it. On the other hand, if a bowl has parallel lines or rings on the exterior, a raised foot or a particularly consistent rim around the top, these are indications that it was turned on a lathe rather than carved by hand.

It should be noted that birdseye maple, while similar to burl in appearance, is not the same thing. The dark, hard knots found in burl are not present in birdseye maple and while many theories have been put forth, scientists do not yet have an explanation for what causes the birdseye effect.

Word of the Week: Canterbury

February 24, 2014 in Decorative Accessories, Furniture, Word of the Week by hdavis

Furniture: Wine Stand; Chippendale, Mahogany, Shell Carved, Shaped Handle, Cabriole Legs, Trifid Feet, 25 inch. Canterbury is one of those terms that, when the piece to which it originally applied fell out of fashion, was simply picked up and applied a second time to another form that was at least in some ways similar to the original. A canterbury in the 18th century was a low wooden stand, typically on casters, with a divided top, the purpose of which was to be set near the dining table and hold plates and cutlery. The form’s name is said to be a nod to the Archbishop of Canterbury who was an early adopter.

At some point, someone took the idea of the divided tray, deepened the wells, and, in some cases, added more compartments to create another portable piece of furniture, this one with slatted spaces for most typically sheet music or magazines and newspapers. These pieces are the forebearers of the modern magazine rack and in typical Victorian fashion, the form gets more elaborate as the 19th century wears on. By the latter part of the century, canterburies have end panels with music-inspired shapes (treble clefs or lyres/harps) and an upper shelf or tray top has been added.

Canterburies still have solid value with collectors, as they remain very useful for holding the exact things they were originally designed to hold and because they were used for the better part of two centuries at the very least, they’re available in a variety of styles and conditions.

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