Charles Rennie Mackintosh
High-back armchair, 1898
Dark-stained oak
Made by Alex Martin
h. 137,8 cm - w. 62,7 cm - d. 45,5 cm
PROVENANCE : Commissioned for Miss Cranston's Argyle Street Tea Rooms in Glasgow - Morrison McChlery Auctioneer, Glasgow, ca. 1958 - Collection of Professor Thomas Howarth, Toronto, early 1960's - Christie's, London, 17th February 1994, lot 131 - Collection of Lord Richard Attenborough, purchased at the above sale - By descent after his death in 2014.
SIMILAR PIECES : Of the five armchairs visible in contemporary photographs of the Tea Rooms, three in the Smoking Room and two in the Billiards Room, only four, including this one, seem to have survived. The remaining three examples are in the collections of the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art near Nagoya, Japan, and the Glasgow University.
EXHIBITION : 'Charles Rennie Mackintosh', School of Architecture, University of Toronto, 1967 - 'Charles Rennie Mackintosh, 1968-1928', Art Gallery of Ontario, 1978 - 'Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Architect and Designer', Federal Reserve System, Washington D.C., 1985.
LITERATURE : The Studio, volume XXXIX, 1907, pages 32-33 - Roger Billcliffe, 'Charles Rennie Mackintosh : The Complete Furniture, Furniture Drawings and Interior Designs', London, 2009, pages 56-57, number 1898.28.
COLLECTION : Saint Louis Art Museum