In 2004, antiques dealer and former Colonial Williamsburg curator Sumpter T. Priddy III organized the exhibition, “American Fancy: Exuberance in the Arts, 1790-1840”, which debuted at the Milwaukee Art Museum in collaboration with the Chipstone Foundation. The accompanying catalogue is a thorough, enlightening and visually dazzling opus to the breadth of the “fancy” style, offering an exhaustive catalogue of American furniture, ceramics, glass, metalwork, textiles, costume and paintings.

“Fancy” (as Priddy first called it in his 1981 University of Delaware/Winterthur Program master’s thesis), describes a style that emerged in the late 18th and early 19th centuries characterized by brightly painted surfaces, stenciled gilding, bold patterns, and playful expressions of line and composition. The painterly treatment of surfaces, in particular, was used in place of expensive materials like mahogany, or laborious processes like ornate inlay and veneer. Everyday, unremarkable furniture and objects became revelatory, infused with imagination to elicit boundless visual pleasure and delight. It is important to also note that “fancy” did not mean expensive nor elite; the painted and stenciled furniture could be produced inexpensively and in large quantities, making it affordable and accessible to a growing middle class market. 19th century American furniture manufacturer Lambert Hitchcock introduced “Hitchcock Furniture”, (now a household name) and was one of the preeminent figures in the popularization of the “fancy” style and its mass production.

Fancy & Flourish is greatly inspired by Priddy’s seminal research. This exhibition, however, represents a point of departure from “fancy” as merely a term included within the academic nomenclature of decorative arts studies, to the representation of a more expansive examination of its very spirit. Contemporary artists utilize ceramics, in particular, to engage with a wide breadth of historical examples of furniture, textiles, lighting and decorative objects, ranging from the early 19th century to the present. “Fancy” becomes the enduring language by which playful patterns, forms and surface treatments can yield deep and vast imaginative possibilities. Fancy continues to flourish.