Queen Anne Side Chair in "Grandmother" Pattern

This modern take on an 18th-century chair is the first work to enter the collection by Robert Venturi—who designed this gallery and the larger building of which it is a part—and his wife and partner Denise Scott Brown. A true collaboration, as is so much of their work, the chair was designed by Venturi and the pattern by Scott Brown. Inspiration for the pattern came from an old tablecloth that belonged to the grandmother of an associate of the artists; it was modified somewhat, and includes overlaid dashes. As Venturi later noted, “We wanted a pattern that was explicitly pretty in its soft, curvy configurations and sweet combinations of colors, and represented as well something with nice associations, those of flowers. By juxtaposing the two patterns, the dashes and the grandmother-tablecloth, we achieved a design involving dramatic contrasts of scale, rhythm, color, and association, and one that is usable in many ways.”