Commercial Neoclassical

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Ornaments
ca. 1810-20
block-printed wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

 

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Drapery
ca. 1810-12
block-printed and flocked wallpaper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Temple Scene
ca. 1785-90
block-printed wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Figures
1787
block-printed wallpaper border
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Maidens arranging Fruit
ca. 1810
block-printed wallpaper dado
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Ornaments
ca. 1790
block printed wallpaper
Cooper Hewitt,
Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous American Maker
Neoclassical Figures
1934
block-printed wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Louis-Gustave Taraval after Louis Bosse
Stove Design in Neoclassical Style
ca. 1791
hand-colored etching
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Wheat Sheaves alternating with Leaves
ca. 1800-1820
block-printed wallpaper border
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Forms
ca. 1800-1820
block-printed wallpaper border
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
 Neoclassical Swans alternating with Lyres
ca. 1800
block-printed and flocked wallpaper border
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Elements
ca. 1800-1805
block-printed wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Elements
ca. 1820-40
block-printed wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Elements
ca. 1820
block-printed and flocked wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Imitation of Découpage
ca. 1800
block-printed wallpaper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Maker
Neoclassical Elements
ca. 1820
block-printed wallpaper frieze
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Ian Hamilton Finlay
Classical / Neoclassical
1987
screenprint
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

20 December 1945

    To one not interested in searching out objects there must have been the frightening, frustrated gloom that hangs over derelicts living and not living, there must have been it extremely in that cardboard St. Pancras Station.

    I thought of this as I nosed about – and the thought of the effect of the place on John and Eric made me hurry, turn away from things rather too unfeelingly.  I was hurrying and there seemed nothing there to redeem the squalor, to clutch at one for rescuing. 

    Then I walked down the last aisle and saw in the middle what looked at first like a not very remarkable early-to-mid-Victorian little couch – Récamier thickened and toughened and having developed turned stumpy legs instead of delicate out-sweeping Greek ones.  But what really held my glance when I looked nearer was the covering of the couch, the flat loose cushion and the round tailored sausage one.  They were all of tomato soup red horsehair, dirtied of course, but remembering its life of eighty, ninety, perhaps nearly a hundred years, really in wonderful condition.  And what a wonderful stuff too, this never before seen red horsehair, glistening like glass threads, rich and hard and heartless, built to wear people out, not be worn out by them.  The cushions made so stiffly and truly, everything about the couch showing solid worthiness, as much as any Victorian piece I had seen; and its ugly, Gothic, sharp parrot smartness simply calling out to be used, sat upon and loved. 

– from The Journals of Denton Welch (who was born in 1915, gravely injured in 1935, then wrote the journals between 1942 and his early death in 1948), edited by Michael De-la-Noy (1984)

Unattributed (Italy)

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Frieze
ca. 1550-1600
drawing
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Frieze
ca. 1800-1850
drawing
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Ornamental Vase
ca. 1800-1820
drawing
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Painted Wall
ca. 1800-1830
ink on paper, with added watercolor
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Frieze with Sphinxes
ca. 1805
drawing
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Ornamental Merman
ca. 1625-50
drawing
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist after Raphael
Standing Draped Figure
18th century
drawing
Art Institute of Chicago

Anonymous Italian Artist after Raphael
Stoning of Stephen
18th century
drawing
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Painted Ceiling and Wall
ca. 1815-30
watercolor and ink on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Sepulchral Monument for Three Brothers
cs. 1590-1610
watercolor and ink on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Design for Wallpaper Border
cs. 1825-30
gouache on blue paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Italian Artist
Stage Design with Neoclassical Buildings
ca. 1810-20
watercolor and ink on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Florentine Printmaker
Minchiate Card
Angel sounding the Last Trump
17th century
woodcut with pochoir
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Florentine Printmaker
Minchiate Card
Chalice
17th century
woodcut with pochoir
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Florentine Printmaker
Minchiate Card
Jester with Children
17th century
woodcut with pochoir
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Florentine Printmaker
Minchiate Card
Romulus and Remus
17th century
woodcut with pochoir
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Florentine Printmaker
Minchiate Card
Wise Man
17th century
woodcut with pochoir
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

from Divine Epigrams

        Upon the Asse that bore our Saviour.

Hath onely Anger an Omnipotence

                                        In Eloquence?

Within the lips of Love and Joy doth dwell

                                        No miracle?

Why else had Baalams Asse a tongue to chide

                                        His Masters pride?

And thou (Heaven-burthen'd Beast!) hast ne're a word

                                        To praise thy Lord?

That he should find a Tongue and vocall Thunder,

                                        Was a great wonder.

But ô me thinkes 'tis a farre greater one

                                        That thou find'st none.     

– Richard Crashaw, Steps to the Temple (1648)

Designs on Paper

Tommi Parzinger
Design for Printed Textile
ca. 1930
gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Tommi Parzinger
Design for Wallpaper
ca. 1940
gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Tommi Parzinger
Design for Cigarette-Holder and Lighter
ca. 1950
drawing
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Claes Oldenburg
Proposal for a Colossal Monument in the Form of a Typewriter Eraser for Alcatraz
1972
graphite and watercolor on paper
Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC

Gilles-Marie Oppenord
Design for Mirror Frame
ca. 1730
ink and watercolor on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Gilles-Marie Oppenord
Design for Clock Case
ca. 1700
ink and watercolor on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Artist
Design for Window Hanging
ca. 1790-1800
drawing (ink and watercolor on paper)
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Artist
Neoclassical Design for Woven Textile
ca. 1820
drawing (ink and gouache on paper)
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Austrian Artist
Design for Painted Ceiling and Wall
ca. 1830-50
watercolor and gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Austrian Artist
Design for Painted Wall
ca. 1830-50
watercolor and gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Austrian Artist
Design for Painted Wall
ca. 1830-50
watercolor and gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous Austrian Artist
Wallpaper Design
ca. 1840-60
gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous European Artist
Design for Bronze Clock
ca. 1810-30
ink and watercolor on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Artist
Acanthus Design for Woven Textile
ca. 1815-25
gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Anonymous French Artist
Design for Candelabrum with Gilt-Bronze Mounts
ca. 1780
ink and watercolor on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Dorothy Pease
Staccato
(textile design for Perspectives Inc, New York)
ca. 1942
ink and gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Dorothy Pease
Butterflies
(textile design for Perspectives Inc, New York)
ca. 1942
ink and watercolor on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Medea

[from the speech of the Chorus to dissuade Medea from her purpose of putting her Children to death, and flying for protection to Athens]

O haggard queen! to Athens dost thou guide

    Thy glowing chariot, steep'd in kindred gore;

Or seek to hide thy damned parracide

    Where Peace and Mercy dwell for evermore?

                                  *

In thine own children's gore? – oh! ere they bleed,

    Let Nature's voice thy ruthless heart appal!

Pause at the bold, irrevocable deed –

    The mother strikes – the guiltless babes shall fall!

Think what remorse thy maddening thoughts shall sting,

    When dying pangs their gentle bosoms tear;

Where shalt thou sink, when ling'ring echoes ring

    The screams of horror in thy tortur'd ear?

No! let thy bosom melt to Pity's cry –

    In dust we kneel – by sacred Heaven implore –

O! stop thy lifted arm, ere yet they die,

    Nor dip thy horrid hands in infant gore! –

– Euripides (485-406 BC), translated by Thomas Campbell (1799)