Desk and bookcase

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The blocked, tripartite desk drawers and shell-carved fall-front provide a sturdy foundation for the towering bookcase with a grand arched pediment. Behind the bookcase doors lie cubbyholes and drawers in which business and household records were stored. Many colonial Rhode Island families made their livelihoods through the transatlantic exchange of enslaved people, sugar, and other commodities. This monumental workstation embodies the superior craftsmanship of Newport cabinetmakers while implicating the destructive commerce and consumption of　the Triangle Trade.

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