Card table

John Townsend

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This deceptively plain table is one of the masterpieces of John Townsend's late oeuvre. It is fashioned from the densest of Cuban or San Domingo mahoganies and retains its original oiled finish. Both the visible stop-fluting and cross-hatching and the interior construction are executed with machinelike precision. The table descended in the Champlin family of Newport, together with a 1765 block-and-shell chest (27.57.1) and a 1789 block-and-shell tall clock (27.57.2).

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art