Armchair After a Throne Painted on the Wall of the Tomb of Rameses III

This French, circa 1805 armchair after a throne painted on the wall of the tomb of Rameses III’s is made of carved and painted wood. The scrolling back with velvet upholstery flanked by posts decorated with bands of ziggurat decoration with stylised plant motifs. This fascinating chair provides an extraordinary example of the influence of Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign on the decorative arts in the first decade of the nineteenth centry. The chair is faithfully reconstructed after a watercolour by the French artist André Dutertre (figure 1) depicting a series of thrones copied from the wall paintings in the fifth tomb of the Kings to the East at biban al Maluk, Thebes.1 Dutertre was one of the official artists who accompanied Napoleon’s forces on their Egyptian campaign, and the series of chairs was reproduced in the Description de L’Egypte (Volume II, Plate 89). The Description, published from 1803 onwards by order of the Emperor himself, superseded Donimique-Vivant Denon’s record of the campaign, his Voyage dans la Basse et al Haute Egypte, as the definitive contemporary work of Egyptology.

The archaeological accuracy of this piece sets it apart from the work of designers such as Thomas Hope in England and Percier and Fontaine in France. Whilst making use of Egyptian motifs, most designers of the period were concerned with creating a stylistic interpretation of Egypt rather than attempting historically accurate reconstructions from archaeological evidence. By contrast, the present chair is faithful to the original wall painting in both its proportion and decoration. Even the original fabric in which it is upholstered corresponds exactly to that covering another of the chairs illustrated by Dutertre in the Description. There remain very few examples of furniture designed after ancient Egyptian prototypes, perhaps the most famous being a pair of armchairs and a bed commissioned by Denon and executed by Jacob-Desmalter.

This distinctive and highly unusual table houses a remarkable collection of semiprecious hardstones and marbles, and bears the mantle and coronet of either a Prince of Russia or a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire.

Interestingly, each stone sample is inscribed on the reverse with its Latin name, indicating they constituted a geological collection. Tabletops inlaid with mineral collections brought back from the Grand Tour in Italy were highly desired in fashionable circles during this period. However, the majority use only marble specimens inlaid in concentric rings on a circular top for decorative effect, as can be seen on a table in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum. The inlaid armorial which centers the table, composed of a red or purple mantle, tasseled and draped and surmounted by a princely coronet, forms part of the arms of a number of royal European lines.  It also signifies either a Prince of Russia or a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire. It is interesting to note that a pair of armorials surmounted by a mantle and coronet similar to that on the present table can be seen on a music cabinet from Schwarzenau Castle in Austria, one of the two being centered by a monogram rather than a coat-of-arms.

Despite the continental associations of the armorial on the present table, its detail reveals a markedly English character. The broadly cast mounts have a lively, somewhat sculptural appearance when compared to their French counterparts, which possess a decidedly precise and mechanical quality at this date. The brass-inlaid decoration on the table legs is also indicative of English manufacture. The stylized foliate design to the legs is typical of English “buhl-work,” which was more simplified and often more sparsely employed than its French equivalent. For example E.T. Joy, in his English Furniture 1800-1850 illustrates a commode and card table of the same period which use “buhl” decoration in a limited fashion to enliven friezes or drawers in much the same manner as the present cabinetmaker has restricted the technique to the legs of the table.

The strong links between English royalty and the European royal and noble families give an indication as to why such an important piece, clearly intended for a European aristocratic household, was created in an English workshop. There were blood ties between the English monarchy and their Hanovarian cousins, themselves Princes of the Holy Roman Empire, and both George IV and William IV married Prussian noblewomen in the persons of Caroline, Duchess of Brunswick and Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen. Frequent visits were made by members of these noble families to their relatives in England, and it is in such a context that it is likely the present table was commissioned.

These magnificent sculpted appliques, circa 1770, closely follow the various designs for trophies produced by the celebrated French architect, decorator, and professor of design Jean Charles Delafosse (1731-1792.) Delafosse first published his collection of ornamental engravings entitled Nouvelle Iconologie Historique in 1768. His designs are featured in collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the British Museum, the Louvre Museum, the Tours Museum of Fine Arts, and the Ashmolean museum of Art and Archaelogy at University of Oxford, among others. He is also responsible for designing two hôtels at 58-60 Rue du Fauborg Poissonière, Paris (1776-1783.) His work was pivotal to the evolution of the goût antique, the type of neoclassicism which was characteristic of the Louis XVI period in France.

The present appliques can be closely compared to two pairs of trophies designed by Delafosse between 1767-77. The first is a pair of military trophies representing Athens and Macedonia. The are centred with the same distinctive angled portrait busts, and feature a fabric swag as do the portraits centring the present pair.

Another pair of trophies by Delafosse representing Pastoral Attributes also contain similar wheatsheafs to those featured on the present appliques, and may represent on this current pair the seasons of Summer and Autumn.

The painter and gilder Jean-Félix Watin offered assistance with executing furniture and objects after Delafosse’s engravings, tempered with the warning, “…If one should seek to follow his [Delafosse's] designs in all their intricate detail, the cost of doing so would surely be too high for even the most wealthy private person.”1 Given the scale of these objects and the quality and intricacy of their execution, it seems likely that they formed part of a commission for one of the great noble, perhaps even Royal French interiors.

Footnotes:

1. Svend Eriksen, Early Neo-Classicism in France, London, 1974, p171.

This chair, one of a set of four neoclassical chairs in our collection,  is derived from the klismos chair, a Greek invention that evolved from a simple throne. Splayed, sabre-form legs and uprights connected by a concave backrest are characteristics of these chairs, which became popular in the late-18th and 19th centuries for their gracefulness and lightness of form, as well as their reference to antiquity. The present chairs are illustrative of the variations on the klismos form that occurred at the end of 18th century during the Neoclassical period in Italy, when furniture was relieved of ornament in favor of simple lines more closely modeled on its classical forbears.

The design of the present chairs, each with an open back centered by a pierced roundel, is closely related to a set of ten documented chairs in the Villa Borghese, Rome, carved by Lucia Landucci in 1784 (right). Landucci was the daughter, or possibly widow, of Antonio Landucci, principal intagliatore (carver) responsible for the refurbishment of the Villa Borghese. Not much is known about Lucia, but there exists documentation of payments made to her for furniture commissions for the Borghese Palace, including payment for a table made for the Stanza di Apollo e Dafne in 1785. (The table unfortunately no longer exists, but was recorded in drawings by French architect Charles Percier, who visited Rome circa 1786-91.)

A reinterpretation of the chairs was also found in the former living room of Queen Friederike Luise at Schloss Monbijou, a Rococo palace in Berlin built in 1706 but destroyed during World War II. Monbijou was redesigned as a gallery to display the Royal collections and opened as a Hohenzollern museum in 1877. The chairs can be seen in situ in the museum in a photograph circa 1930 (left).

This extraordinary set of ten needlework wall hangings depicting views of the Trossachs, Perthshire,  were designed by Alexander Fisher (1864-1936) and executed by the Royal School of Needlework for Fanhams Hall, Ware. They are signed and dated 1907. Alexander Fisher was the leading enameller of the Arts and Crafts period in Britain, who revived the ancient art of ‘Limoges’ enamelling, as well as being an extremely versatile designer, painter and sculptor.

He originally trained as a silversmith and began studying enamelling after attending a series of lectures given by Louis Dalpayrat in Paris.  Fisher was also a very influential teacher who taught at the Central School of Arts and Crafts before setting up a school of enamelling at his Kensington studio in 1904.  His work was widely published at the time in periodicals such as ‘The Studio’ and ‘The Art Journal’ and he regularly exhibited at the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society and the Royal Academy.  Some of Fisher’s works today form part of the permanent exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Musem, Jewellry Gallery.

Fanhams Hall, Ware, Hertfordshire, a vast Queen Anne mansion built in 1715 was purchased in 1859 by Henry Page of Ware, who had made a sizeable fortune in the malting business.  His daughter Anne, who later married Richard Benyon Croft, inherited Fanhams Hall and in 1900 grandly enlarged the house in the Jacobean style employing some of the most renowned designers and craftsmen of her time. She is said to have demanded the highest quality of craftsmanship throughout and spared no expense and as a result left the building enhanced with walnut panelling inlaid with mother of pearl, intricate oak panelling, a Minstrel Gallery, tiled fireplaces, all now of special architectural interest.

The designs for the house incorporated a Long Gallery as its grand entrance, for which the Trossachs Tapestries were specially designed.  They were commissioned from Alexander Fisher in 1907 and were to complement stained glass windows by William Morris.  Several ‘Rose Tree’ panels, which served as curtains were also designed by Fisher, and two of these are now in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

The Trossachs not far from Edinburgh, Scotland, recently designated Trossachs National Park, have long been renowned for their rich variety of wild and beautiful scenery, ranging from high mountain peaks to peaceful wooded slopes, and have inspired many artists and writers like Sir Walter Scott.

Six side chairs signed "Laud"

This set of six side chairs are a rare example of furniture that carries both the name of their maker and date of manufacture, Laud 1764.  Their aesthetic was characterized by a subtle and refined treatment of the fashionable chinoiserie style of the mid-eighteenth century. The backs of the chairs are surmounted by the form of a curving pagoda. Below, the chairs are filled with lattice-work, or Chinese pailing that is strongly characteristic of English chairs designed in the chinoiserie style. In other examples, the chair railings sometimes take fabulously intricate form, but here the pattern is restrained and geometric. The most famous and influential publication to contain examples of such chairs is Thomas Chippendale’s The Gentleman & Cabinetmaker’s Director of 1754.

Laud was working in a style that represented the height of fashionable taste, however, from all the publications he had at his disposal, he drew an original design that handled with dexterity the exotic forms of the taste for the Oriental and combined them with an English restraint drawn recognizably from an earlier tradition of furniture design.

]]> http://carltonhobbsprovenance.com/seating/side-chairs-set-signed-laud/feed 0 http://carltonhobbsprovenance.com/paintings/30-framed-watercolors http://carltonhobbsprovenance.com/paintings/30-framed-watercolors#comments Wed, 08 Dec 2010 16:50:00 +0000 admin http://carltonhobbsprovenance.com/?p=428

Framed Watercolors Depicting Civil Engineering Projects

French. Circa 1750. 

Each within a crossbanded sycamore veneered frame and pink wash mounts.

The watercolors variously depicting bridges, sluices, mills, dykes, excavating machines, etc.  Inscribed extensively including the Bridges,  Pont Du Mas, Pont De Cleroye, Pont De Marcny, and Pont Coutard.

Measurements: Of Various Sizes

Highly Unusual Side Table Designed After the Antique

Probably Sicilian. Circa 1790.

This intriguing table was made in Italy during the last quarter of the eighteenth century at a time when excavations, such as those at Herculaneum, Capua and Trebbia, provided new sources for furniture designers working in the neoclassical idiom.  The revival of neoclassicism had strong nationalist overtones in the still independent regions of Italy, yet while this table was probably conceived as a recreation of a glorious Italian past, contemporary collectors, such as William Hamilton, were already questioning the Roman and Etruscan origins of many of the artefacts found.  In 1765 Hamilton wrote, ‘I have collected a great number of Etruscan vases [and in] my opinion few are really Etruscan, but made by Greek artists.’

While contemporary Italians were unwilling to accept the Greek origins of their antiquities, it is clear that the present table is derived from a uniquely Greek prototype. Figure 1 shows an example of a Greek stool thought to date from the first half of the fifth century BC in which the legs consist of a rounded upper section above a tapering shaft terminating in a very fine point.  The designer of the table is likely to have found this distinctive form on a stool as, ‘tables with the Greeks had much fewer uses than they have with us.’

It was more usual for cabinet-makers to look to classical architecture rather than furniture for inspiration.  Not only is it extraordinary to find a table derived from an Ancient Greek form, it is also rare for a piece to capture so accurately the atmosphere and spirit of antiquity.

Measurements: Height: 36 1/2" (93cm); Width: 47" (119cm); Depth: 23" (58cm).

Pair of Marble Vases

Florentine. 19th Century.

Measurements:

Height: 26" (66cm) Diameter: 24 3/4" (63cm)

A Pair of gilt-wood twelve light chandeliers in the William and Mary Taste by Edward F. Caldwell

New York.
Circa 1900.

http://carltonhobbsprovenance.com/wp-admin/post-new.php

Marks: 

Each stamped within a lozenge:

C (manufactory initial)

Measurements:

Height: 39″ (99 cm); Diameter: 44″ (112 cm).

Description:

Edward Caldwell began his career as a lighting designer at the New York-based gas lighting manufactory Archer & Pancoast in the late 1880s. It was there that he future business partner, Victor F. von Lossberg, with whom he would found Edward F. Caldwell and Company in 1894. His pieces were often based on historical models, but Caldwell also excelled in conceiving original designs which he produced to fit his clients’ individual decorative demands.  The quality of his work often rivaled the 18th- and 19th-century prototypes from which he drew, and, particularly in his gilding, Caldwell’s techniques were far superior to those of his contemporaries.
Caldwell’s work appeared in prominent buildings such as the White House and the Waldorf Astoria, and in homes of affluent New Yorkers including Henry Clay Frick and Andrew Carnegie.  Electric fixtures were relatively new and many that did exist were not particularly suitable for rooms decorated with antiques. “[Caldwell’s] rich and conservative clientele preferred traditional interiors, so Caldwell based his lighting fixtures predominantly on historical styles, often using photographs of objects in European palaces as models, or relying on eighteenth century pattern books.”
The design for the present chandeliers was undoubtedly taken from a model made by Francis Garthorne (fl. 1690-1713) for the King’s Presence Chamber at Hampton Court (circa 1690), the former royal residence, now part of the Royal Collection. Garthorne was a prominent English silversmith working in the Huguenot style and was frequently employed by William and Mary, as in the case of the Hampton Court Chandelier. The four shell-topped cartouches that surmount the top of both the original and the Caldwell chandeliers contain the symbols of a rose, a fleur-de-lys, a thistle and a harp. These represent England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, respectively, and are the symbols adorning, among other objects, the Hampton House Palace gates.  A photograph of an eighteen-light Caldwell chandelier closely related to the present pair, though with different crests in the four cartouches topping the fixture, can be found in the Cooper Hewitt Museum Library’s Edward F. Caldwell Lighting Collection (numbered “a80742″).