Armchair from Collection of Joseph Fesch

This ornate gilded armchair is part of a large collection of furniture commissioned by Joseph Fesch, a Catholic cardinal and uncle of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte. The probable craftsmen were Lorenzo and Dionisio Santi of Rome. James Monroe may have acquired this chair and other pieces of the collection for use in the White House from a sale of Fesch furniture held in Paris in 1816. Several chairs of similar design are displayed in the Cross Hall of the White House, on loan from the Philadelphia Museum of Art.