Chinese Root Wood Table

A sculpted tangle of holes and hollows that could pass for a small mountain range.

This root wood table is from Hebei Province, China, and dates to the early 20th century. Tibetans were traditionally semi-nomadic and owned few personal furnishings, so most Tibetan furniture stood in monasteries, and some of it was carted over the Himalayas to India as monasteries were destroyed. Gnarled natural form with swirling ridges, rounded voids and knobbed projections. The honey-orange surface is smooth and glossy, with darker brown recesses inside the openings. A flat top sits above a broad, uneven base. It is 31.5 inches long, 21.5 deep and 37 high.

Twisted by nature and polished by somebody patient.