American Style: Russell Kettell's Pine Furniture
February 1, 2008 - May 18, 2008

 


"Boxes," Top: Coastal New Hampshire, 1710-1750, Private Collection
Middle: New England, 1750-1780, painted pine, F1038, Gift of Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection
Bottom: New England, 1710-1750, Private Collection


"Miniature Six-Board Cases", (left) New England, about 1800, Painted pine, F1080, Gift of Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection
(right) New England, 19th century, Painted pine, H1581, Gift of Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection


"Peacock Weathervane," New England, 19th century, Painted pine, iron nails, M320, Gift of Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection

 

Mirror

 


"Looking Glass," Boston, mid 18th century, Wood, pine, mirrored glass, F1079, Gift of Mr. Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection

 

 

Box Detail



Box and Six Board Chest, Top: Hampton, New Hampshire, 1680-1715, Private Collection
Bottom: Hampton, New Hampshire, 1680-1715, Pine, F1085, Gift of Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection



 


Whirlygig






"Whirlygig" America, 19th century, Painted pine, M318, Gift of Russell H. Kettell, Concord Museum Collection

 

 

Chest with Drawers
"Chest with Drawers", Possibly Middlesex County, Massachusetts, 1730-1750, White pine, yellow pine, maple; brass, F308, Concord Museum Collection

Who Was Russell Kettell?

Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Russell Hawes Kettell (1890-1958) was the son of Fanny Russell Hawes and Charles Willard Kettell. He was educated at the Middlesex School in Concord, Massachusetts and Harvard University, graduating in 1914. He interrupted his graduate studies in architecture during the war to serve in the army, where he was assigned to designing hospitals.

"I like teaching, " Kettell reported in 1939, and he demonstrated the truth of that understatement in ways. His vocation was literally that of teacher -- he taught at the Middlesex School from 1921 to 1956, the first full-time art teacher in any of the eastern private boys' schools -- but his devotion to teaching extended well beyond ivy-covered walls. Russell Kettell influenced students, woodworkers and antique collectors alike.

Russell Kettell is best known as the author of two popular books on Amercian decorative arts: The Pine Furniture of Early New England (1929), and Early American Rooms (1936). Both are filled with instruction, and laid out as carefully as any curriculum. Kettell's book on period rooms, compiled with the help of the first generation of American museum professionals to interpret American art, was the first to define the canon for the re-creation of historic domestic interiors. His book on pine furniture similarly defined for generations the distinctive appeal of the vernacular furniture of New England.

Russell Kettell's Role at the Concord Museum

In 1929, the Concord Museum, then the Concord Antiquarian Society, determined to move out of the 18th-century house it had used for display since 1886 and into a new building built for the purpose a short distance away. The plan was to install a chronological series of period rooms, after the model established by the Brooklyn Museum, the Metropolitan Museum, and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Russell Kettell, collaborating with the Society's director, historian Allen French, and architect Harry Little, took on the task of locating and purchasing the period paneling that would be used to create the effect of early interiors.

At the time, the Concord Museum collection was already famous, being featured in many of the works of early popular writers on American antiques, from Alice Morse Earle to Wallace Nutting, and the re-opening was met with some appreciable fanfare. The new installations were celebrated as "state of the art" and were pictured in most of the periodicals devoted to the subject of antiques, including, in several series of articles, House Beautiful and Antiques Magazine. Since that time, the Concord Museum has been a favored destination of all students of American antiques.

Kettell continued -- as Vice-President and President of the Society from 1936 to 1956 - to be involved at the Museum. During that time, he added several components to the exhibition spaces aimed at teaching in great detail aspects of 17th-century joinery, iron hardware, and brass furniture pulls. He assembed study collections of ceramics, newspapers, lighting devices, looking glasses and wooden paneling, among other subjects, donating them all, along with his collection of furniture (over 1,000 objects in all) to the Concord Museum.

Russell Kettell's Influence Today

In Kettell's 25th aniversary to report to the Harvard Class of 1914, he attributed his longevity to "an acquisitive appetite for Carver chairs, shadow moulded wainscot, and hand wrought nails." Over time, antiques dealers and collectors who worked hard to uncover material like that which Kettell appreciated and acquired have themselves become identified with it. The name of Massachusetts collector Nina Fletcher Little, or of Roger Bacon, a dealer in New Hampshire active in the 1950s and 60s, or that of Lilian Blankely Cogan, a dealer from Connecticut, is as likely to be summoned up as Kettell's when a great pipe box or spoon rack is admired. David Hillier, a present-day dealer in Massachusetts, noted that "Russell Hawes Kettell's passion and pursuit of early American objects made of pine edified his students of long ago and inspired many of us to understand and translate the importance of line, design and function as we experience and contemplate utility and the artistic success of rare objects."

The aesthetic Kettell recorded, analyzed, emulated, and expressed his appreciation for in his publications is often termed "country" or "primitive" and as a fashion, it floods and ebbs. As early as 1930, one dealer advertised plaintively in Antiques Magazine that the vogue for primitive furniture was not dead, as had clearly been reported. Humble objects of long ago -- painted blanket chests, provincial chairs, old weather vanes -- continue to bring record prices at auction whenever great examples appear. Today, as Russell Kettell noted in 1929, "probably it is the spirit of frank simplicity that gives this work its fundamental appeal."



Intrigued?   Make plans now to visit American Style: Russell Kettell's Pine Furniture at the Concord Museum February 1, 2008 through May 18, 2008.

Dates to Remember:

  • Be Our Guest. Sundays, January 13 and 20, 2008. Admission-Free Sundays. Winter evenings are a perfect time to visit the Museum. Bring family, friends or out of town guests to visit our nationally recognized collection. Free admission from 1:00-4:00 PM.

  • Exhibition Opening Reception
    Thursday, January 31     
    Preview the Museum’s newest, ground-breaking exhibition focused on the contribution of Russell Kettell to American decorative arts. 6:00 - 8:00 p.m.; for Museum Members only.

  • Afternoon Tea, American Style. Every Thursday, Friday, and Satruday in Febrary and March. Bring a friend, neighbor or family member on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays for warming tea and delicious sweets in the Concord Museum's elegant Brooke hall. 1:00 - 3:00 PM; $15 tea; $20 tea & Museum admission. On a walk-in, space available basis.

  • Gallery Talk with Curator David Wood.
    Sunday, February 3rd. 2:00 PM. Reservations requested. Free with admission, Members free.
  • Museum Story Hour. Friday, February 8th, 1:00 PM. Children ages 3 -5 with an adult are introduced to the book I Love Tools by Philemon Sturges. Led by a Museum educator, the story hour includes a book-related craft activity and a snack.  $8 Adult/Child pair, $5 Member pair. Reservations required. (978) 369-9763.

  • American Style Woodworking Workshop #1: Wall Box with Drawer
    Saturday, February 23rd. Master Craftsman and teacher John Barron guides, instructs and inspires as you make an American Style family heirloom that will be treasured for years to come.  No woodworking skills are needed…just a "real love of making things." This wonderful box, based on Plate 3 in Kettell’s The Pine Furniture of Early New England, is just right for storing all manner of today’s odds and ends—keys, mail, iPod and cellphone. 11:00-2:00; $70 Members; $90 Nonmembers, includes materials/tools; by reservation, (978) 369-9763.

  • Mary M. Lesneski Memorial Lecture.
    "Form, Function & Fashion in Early American Furniture"
    Thursday, February 28. Elisabeth Garrett Widmer, author, educator and consultant to museums nationally, presents the 2008 Mary M. Lesneski Memorial Lecture.  Well-known as a dynamic lecturer on fine and decorative arts and American social history, Elisabeth Garrett Widmer is the author of the award-winning At Home: The American Family 1750-1870.  She has served in positions at Strawbery Banke Museum, the D.A.R. Museum, Christie's, Sotheby's and The Magazine Antiques. Afternoon Tea organized by the Concord Museum Guild of Volunteers follows the illustrated lecture.1:00 PM; $26; $20 Members; by reservation, (978) 369-9763.

  • "Wood: Craft, Culture, History" •  presented by Harvey Green. March 2, 2:00 pm
    Whether you care about wood's utility or its decorative potential, about the art of turning or the botany of the baseball bat, this lecture will be of interest for all who prize wood as a substance, appreciate its amazing history, or are concerned about its future. Harvey Green is a professor of history at Northeastern University in Boston and works in wood at his shop in rural New Hampshire. He is a two-time Fulbright Scholar and the author of three books on American material culture. 2:00 PM; $15; $10 Members; by reservation.

  • Museum Story Hour. Friday, March 7th, 1:00 PM. Children ages 3 -5 with an adult are introduced to the book Hammer Soup by the Shuberts. Led by a Museum educator, the story hour includes a book-related craft activity and a snack.  $8 Adult/Child pair, $5 Member pair. Reservations required. (978) 369-9763.

  • American Style Blacksmithing Workshop. Saturday, March 8.
    In collaboration with iron craftsman and artist Carl Close, Jr. of Hammersmith Studios, this three-hour class introduces you to the world of forging and blacksmithing. Create a colonial-style wall hook and hand forged nail to take home, similar to those in the Museum’s Kettell collection. No experience is necessary.  The workshop will be held at Hammersmith Studios in West Concord. 9:00 - noon; $70 Members; $80 Nonmembers; all tools and materials provided; by reservation, (978) 369-9763.

  • American Style Woodworking Workshop #2: Cradle
    Saturday, March 29th. In the second of three workshops, join Master Craftsman and teacher John Barron as he guides, instructs and inspires as you make an American Style family heirloom that will be treasured for years to come. Based on a cradle from the 1770s and illustrated in Plate 220 in Kettell’s book, this treasured piece of furniture will be passed down through generations of your own family.10:00-4:00; $120 Members; $140 Nonmembers, includes all materials and tools; by reservation, (978) 369-9763. No woodworking skills are needed…just a "real love of making things."

  • Museum Story Hour. Friday, April 11th, 1:00 PM. Children ages 3 -5 with an adult are introduced to the book There's Always Room for One More by the Shuberts. Led by a Museum educator, the story hour includes a book-related craft activity and a snack.  $8 Adult/Child pair, $5 Member pair. Reservations required. (978) 369-9763.

  • American Style Woodworking Workshop #3: Small Six-board Chest
    Saturday, April 12th. In the final Woodworking Workshop, join Master Craftsman and teacher John Barron as he guides, instructs and inspires as you make an American Style family heirloom that will be treasured for years to come. Bring along your favorite young person to learn basic woodcraft and build this traditional-style chest, shown in Kettell’s furniture book in Plate 30.  Just right for keepsakes, this chest might be the perfect Mother’s Day gift!  10:00-12:00; child age 10-16, accompanied by an adult; $70 Members; $90 Nonmembers; includes materials/tools; by reservation, (978) 369-9763.

  • Museum Story Hour. Friday, May 9th, 1:00 PM. Children ages 3 -5 with an adult are introduced to the book Workshop by Andrew Clements. Led by a Museum educator, the story hour includes a book-related craft activity and a snack.  $8 Adult/Child pair, $5 Member pair. Reservations required. (978) 369-9763.

For prices and more information about these and additional programs, check the Online Calendar.  To make reservations, please call the Museum office at (978) 369-9763.
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