High chest of drawers

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The decoration on this chest, with its motifs and palette of red, orange, and what was originally bright yellow on a black ground, was meant to imitate a technique known as japanning. Beginning in the mid-seventeenth century, imported Japanese and Chinese lacquer cabinets and screens became extremely popular in England. This lacquer work was much imitated in London on furniture and wall paneling. The technique eventually spread to Boston by about 1700.

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