Double Sewing Desk or Work Stand
Unidentified Enfield Shaker maker (Enfield, New Hampshire), American, active 1793-1923
about 1830-1870
Pine with red stain, brass
Overall: 46 × 38 × 22 1/2 in. (116.8 × 96.5 × 57.2 cm)
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Gift of Frank C. and Clara G. Churchill
46.22.16382
Geography
Place Made: United States, North America
Period
19th century
Object Name
Furniture: Storage
Research Area
Decorative Arts
On view
Label
Established just twenty minutes from Hanover, the Enfield Shaker Community supported the Upper Valley’s agricultural production and industry throughout much of the nineteenth century. The Shakers established their New Hampshire community along a waterway to take advantage of water-powered saws, mills, and machinery. While a man constructed this sewing desk, two women—one seated on either side—used this desk to sew goods for themselves and their community. Shaker-manufactured hosiery produced by water-powered machines was shipped and sold to the public beginning in the mid-1800s.
The Shakers were a religious sect organized in mid-1750s England that established itself in the United States in the 1770s. Egalitarian, they espoused early arguments for gender and racial equality, pacifism, and lived celibate lives in sequestered rural communities.
From the 2023 exhibition Liquidity: Art, Commodities, and Water, curated by Michael Hartman, Jonathan Little Cohen Associate Curator of American Art
Course History
First Year Student Enrichment Program - Cultures, Identities and Belongings, Francine A'Ness, Summer 2023
Exhibition History
American Art at Dartmouth: Highlights from the Hood Museum of Art, William B. Jaffe and Evelyn A. Jaffe Hall Galleries, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, June 9-December 9, 2007.
American Folk Art at the Hood Museum of Art (a thematic partial permanent gallery installation); Israel Sack Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, July 16, 2015.
An Ever-Widening Circle of Friends, The Enfield Shaker Museum, Enfield, New Hampshire, May 30-October 31, 2006.
Israel Sack Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, May 12-June 22, 1997.
Israel Sack Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, September 16, 1997-May 1, 2002.
Liquidity: Art, Commodities, and Water, Israel Sack Gallery and the Rush Family Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, July 29, 2023-June 16, 2024.
Shaker Joinery in New Hampshire, Spring Forum, Museum at Lower Shaker Village, Enfield, New Hampshire, April 12, 1997.
The Israel Sack Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, 1989-1990.
Webster Cottage, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire.
Publication History
Barbara J. MacAdam, American Art at Dartmouth: Highlights from the Hood Muesum of Art, Hanover: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 2007, p. 229, no. 201.
Provenance
From "Old Shaker Colony" Enfield Shakers, New Hampshire; collected by Frank C. (1850-1912) and Clara G. Churchill (1851-1945), Lebanon, New Hampshire; given to present collection, 1946.
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