An analysis of the Emery shop attributions
Date
1999
Authors
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
This paper is a formal analysis of twenty-nine examples of furniture to determine the likelihood that they were produced in a seventeenth century workshop operated by the Emery family in Newbury. Massachusetts. An object entry in New England Begins in 1982 and an ensuing 1985 paper attributed the twenty-nine pieces of furniture to the Emery shop using a synthesis of the connoisseurship method and the shop tradition model. ☐ Until 1982 the Dennis/Searle shop tradition was the only widely acknowledged seventeenth century Essex County joinery shop. In 1982 catalog entries for a groundbreaking exhibition of seventeenth century New England material culture. New England Begins, postulated that a table and one or two artifacts with provenance from Newbury, MA were produced in the previously little known Jacques shop. Subsequent entries attributed a chamber table with distinct type turnings to the Symonds' shop of Salem, MA and a cupboard to the Emery shop of Newbury, MA. In 1985. “The Emery Attribution” suggested that the cupboard belonged to a group of twenty-nine artifacts that share enough structural and ornamental features to be associated with one another. All were assigned an Emery shop attribution. ☐ This paper examines the twenty-nine examples of furniture included in “The Emery Attribution.” The purpose of the examination is to determine if the construction of numerous chests-of-drawers, cupboards, boxes, tables, etc reveal a group of unusual and related features that demonstrate that the furniture was produced in a single shop tradition. The construction analysis focuses upon joinery techniques and the analysis of the index features that were enumerated to substantiate the attribution. ☐ The examination of the furniture attributed to the Emery shop raises significant concerns about “The Emery Attribution.” Several of the artifacts are too extensively restored to attribute to a seventeenth century maker. Additionally several artifacts are so unique that they can not be closely associated with any other artifact in the sample. The remaining body of work is relatively small and includes work of several different forms. The construction techniques used to build the forms differ in significant ways from form to form and preclude the use of construction features to attribute any of the furniture in a given form to a single example of furniture in a different form. The study concludes that unless additional and substantial documentary evidence is uncovered that the Emery attributions can not be substantiated.