Secretary Cabinet (1732): Artwork and History

Secretary Cabinet (1732) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as John Kirkhoffer (active Ireland, 1732–83) Dublin.

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

18th-century Dublin was a booming city, attracting furniture makers and customers from England and the rest of Europe. Among the former were the Kirkhoffer family, German Protestants who had fled the area of Germany known as the Rhineland-Palatinate to escape religious persecution. The family included John Kirkhoffer, who has been identified as the maker of this secretary desk thanks to modern technology, which revealed his signature inside the base of one of the small drawers, along with facitt / 1732 (made in 1732). It is fairly rare to find craftsmen’s names on their work during this time period. The Art Institute’s piece is one of a group of five similar secretary bookcases, one of which is in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The Victoria and Albert’s cabinet is probably most similar to the Art Institute’s; it shares the same bold setback, with the upper portion of the secretary literally moved back in relation to the bottom half and sides.

Object facts

• Title: Secretary Cabinet
• Date: 1732
• Artist attribution: John Kirkhoffer (active Ireland, 1732–83) Dublin
• Place of origin: Ireland
• Medium: Walnut, holly, oak, pine, gesso, gilding, mirror glass, brass, and iron
• Dimensions: Overall: 211.8 × 125.8 × 58.8 cm (83 3/8 × 49 1/2 × 23 1/8 in.)
• Type: Furniture
• Department: Applied Arts of Europe
• Reference number: 1957.200

Collection credit

Gift of Robert Allerton

View the original

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The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.