George Nakashima
Kornblut Case, 1973
Material: American Black Walnut
The Kornblut Case, named after a client of George Nakashima, was originally designed circa 1963-64.
The design of the Kornblut Case features Nakashima’s signature exposed, hand-worked dovetail joinery along the juncture of the top and sides of each case.
“In many respects this small cabinet is the most anonymous of all of Nakashima’s designs for case pieces or storage units. Its fundamental statement of form is determined by simple dovetail joinery used to secure the four boards of the case together. This construction recalls that of late-seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English chest of drawers and cabinets which hid similar construction beneath decorative veneers. Naskashima’s use of carefully selected solid boards of wood negated the need for veneers. Like many of his antecedents in the Arts and Crafts Movement of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Nakashima strongly objected to the veneer treatment of wood, calling it tantamount to immorality. Camouflaging a piece’s construction and reducing thick boards of wood to thin, paperlike sheets of veneer denied its essential nature” (‘George Nakashima Full Circle’, Derek E. Ostergard, 1989, p.164).
George Nakashima was born in Spokane, Washington in 1905 to Japanese parents who had immigrated to the United States. Educated and trained as an architect at the University of Washington, Nakashima received his Master’s degree in Architecture from M.I.T. in 1930. After working briefly as an architect in the United States he left for Paris seeking the creative energies of one of the great urban centers of the day. From there he traveled extensively, ending up at the home of his grandmother, living on a farm on the outskirts of Tokyo.
| Dimensions | 20 × 18 × 22 in |
|---|---|
| Artist | |
| Date | 1973 |
| Material | American black walnut |
| Style |
