Living with antiques: a collection in Baton Rouge.

Among the collectors of American fine and decorative arts, it is fascinating to recall that a number of the most prominent and passionate were naturalized citizens. Israel Sack (1883-1959) comes immediately to mind. A Lithuanian-born cabinetmaker, Sack immigrated to Boston in 1903 and later established the great New York City emporium for American antiques that bore his name. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, was greatly enriched by a man trained as an opera tenor in his native Saint Petersburg. Maxim Karolik (1893-1963) came to the United States in the Roaring Twenties and married a doyenne of the New England aristocracy, Martha Codman (1858-1948) of Boston and Newport. Together they avidly acquired American fine art and folk art, as well as eighteenth-century American decorative arts.

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The collection featured in this article has been formed over fifteen years by a couple from Iran. Drs. Mohamad M. and Fahimeh Hanachi Tahvildari both received their specialty training at the Louisiana State University School of Medicine in New Orleans. There they fell under the spell of southern Louisiana's unique cultural melange. When they moved to Baton Rouge to begin their medical practice and start their collection, the halcyon days of forming large collections of early Louisiana furniture had already passed. They have, however, been able to acquire several choice pieces of early Louisiana and West Indian furniture. In addition, they have formed a distinguished collection of New Orleans and other American silver, and significant holdings of Louisiana paintings from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Finally, the Tahvildaris have a penchant for furniture of the Federal and classical periods--especially that made in New York City.

Providing an appropriate backdrop for the collection is an octagonal house designed by the Louisiana architect William Hughes in 1982. While clearly contemporary, the house pays homage to the past with its excellent proportions, high ceilings, southern yellow pine parquet flooring, and fine millwork and hardware.

The inviting entrance hall (Pl. II) is illuminated by a patinated and gilt-bronze argand or colza chandelier of about 1820 to 1830 marked "JOHNSTON & BROOKS/MANUFACTURERS/LONDON." The firm of brass founders was active under that name from 1814 to at least 1824 at 32 New Street in London. (1) The inlaid mahogany and satinwood pembroke table, a fine example of the Philadelphia interpretation of this form, dates from about 1795 to 1810. It was formerly at Mistletoe Plantation near Natchez, Mississippi. (2) Above the table is one of three watercolors in the collection by Boyd Cruise (see also Pl. XI). (3) Born in Mississippi, Cruise spent most of his life in southern Louisiana. In the late 1930s he discovered the New Orleans Notarial Archives, which is a unique cache of almost five thousand precisely rendered watercolors of New Orleans buildings, (4) and began to produce lively architectural views of nineteenth-century New Orleans. At different seasons and times of day, in rain or sunshine, these scenes are usually populated with people from all social classes in period dress, as well as with animals, wagons, and carriages. (5) Most of Cruise's work is in collections in Louisiana and Texas, but his paintings in the classical American tradition, as exemplified by the three in the Tahvildari collection, prove that he should be better known on a national basis.

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