Design for a Chimneypiece
1743–1800
Medium
Pen and brown ink, brush and gray wash
Dimensions
sheet: 8 3/4 x 10 3/4 in. (22.2 x 27.3 cm)
Classification
Drawings|Ornament & Architecture
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1935
Accession Number
35.73.5
Tags
Art Historical Context
Sir William Chambers’s “ for a Chimneypiece” offers window into eighteenth-century architectural practice. Created between 1743 and 1800, the drawing presents a carefully proportioned fireplace surround intended to serve as the visual and social heart of an elegant interior. As a leading neoclassical architect, Chambers such studies to explore how ornament could harmonize with classical principles balance and restraint. Executed in pen and brown ink with gray wash, the sheet demonstrates the precision required for architectural proposals of the period. The fluid brushwork adds subtle depth an...
About the Artist
Sir William Chambers · 1723–1796
### Sir William Chambers (1723–1796) Born on 23 February 1723 in Gothenburg, Sweden, to parents of Scottish descent—his father a merchant—Sir William Chambers embarked on an extraordinary path that bridged continents and cultures. At just 16, after initial education in England, he joined the Swedish East India Company, undertaking three voyages to China in the 1740s. These journeys profoundly sha...