拍品专文
Pierre Gole (d.1684), maître menuisier en ébène du Roi
This ebony and brass-enriched cabinet, richly polychromed in rosy flower-inlaid tortoiseshell and recalling Florentine cabinets with pietra dura marble, is designed in the Louis XIV antique style introduced by the Manufacture Royale des Gobelins at Versailles. This type of marquetry, inlaid with ivory appears to have been produced in France from the middle of the 17th Century, as the artist J. M. Picard mentions a similar piece in a letter to a friend in Anvers in 1655 (T. Lunsingh Scheurleer, The Philippe d'Orléans Ivory Cabinet by Pierre Gole [now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London], Burlington Magazine, June 1984, p. 333).
Indeed, by this time cardinal de Mazarin (d. 1661) already owned such inlaid cabinets, as they are isted in an inventory of his possession in 1653. It is probably also at this date that he commissioned two new cabinets decorated, among others, with fleurs, oiseaux et insectes, which, in the inventory drawn up after his death are attributed to Pierre Gole (d. 1684), who became maître menuisier en ébène ordinaire du Roi (the young Louis XIV) in 1651.
The indistinct descriptions of these cabinets in the inventory unfortunately prevent any positive identification with this cabinet, although the style and the quality certainly evoke a comparison. Furthermore, the size and the base, which is inspired by Tuscan prototypes, aswell as the richness of the colours is reminiscent of the cabinet delivered to the appartements of the duc d'Orléans in the Palais Royal by Pierre Gole in 1662 (A. Pradère, French Furniture Makers, London, 1989, p. 44).
Although there are similarities with the work of the Anvers and Florence ateliers of the mid-17th Century, such as that of Leonardo van der Vinne, the attribution to Pierre Gole is based on distinctive characteristics found in his documented oeuvre; thus, the floral swags with ivory inlay between the columned supports can be found on the cabinet supplied to Monsieur, the brother of Louis XIV, while the column-supports with the lower section decorated with floral marquetry below an ormolu band and a section with plain tortoiseshell is also found on a Louis XIV cabinet which was sold anonymously in these Rooms, 23 June 1988, lot 109. Furthermore the interior with its trompe l'oeil architecture and pediment supported by Solomonic columns is identical to contemporary cabinets commissioned from Pierre Gole for the rue Guirsade, Faubourg Sain-Germain by Macé Bertrand de la Bazinière in 1646 (J.B. Chapuis, Le Cabinet Fouquet, L'Objet d'Art, June 1992, p. 74).
This ebony and brass-enriched cabinet, richly polychromed in rosy flower-inlaid tortoiseshell and recalling Florentine cabinets with pietra dura marble, is designed in the Louis XIV antique style introduced by the Manufacture Royale des Gobelins at Versailles. This type of marquetry, inlaid with ivory appears to have been produced in France from the middle of the 17th Century, as the artist J. M. Picard mentions a similar piece in a letter to a friend in Anvers in 1655 (T. Lunsingh Scheurleer, The Philippe d'Orléans Ivory Cabinet by Pierre Gole [now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London], Burlington Magazine, June 1984, p. 333).
Indeed, by this time cardinal de Mazarin (d. 1661) already owned such inlaid cabinets, as they are isted in an inventory of his possession in 1653. It is probably also at this date that he commissioned two new cabinets decorated, among others, with fleurs, oiseaux et insectes, which, in the inventory drawn up after his death are attributed to Pierre Gole (d. 1684), who became maître menuisier en ébène ordinaire du Roi (the young Louis XIV) in 1651.
The indistinct descriptions of these cabinets in the inventory unfortunately prevent any positive identification with this cabinet, although the style and the quality certainly evoke a comparison. Furthermore, the size and the base, which is inspired by Tuscan prototypes, aswell as the richness of the colours is reminiscent of the cabinet delivered to the appartements of the duc d'Orléans in the Palais Royal by Pierre Gole in 1662 (A. Pradère, French Furniture Makers, London, 1989, p. 44).
Although there are similarities with the work of the Anvers and Florence ateliers of the mid-17th Century, such as that of Leonardo van der Vinne, the attribution to Pierre Gole is based on distinctive characteristics found in his documented oeuvre; thus, the floral swags with ivory inlay between the columned supports can be found on the cabinet supplied to Monsieur, the brother of Louis XIV, while the column-supports with the lower section decorated with floral marquetry below an ormolu band and a section with plain tortoiseshell is also found on a Louis XIV cabinet which was sold anonymously in these Rooms, 23 June 1988, lot 109. Furthermore the interior with its trompe l'oeil architecture and pediment supported by Solomonic columns is identical to contemporary cabinets commissioned from Pierre Gole for the rue Guirsade, Faubourg Sain-Germain by Macé Bertrand de la Bazinière in 1646 (J.B. Chapuis, Le Cabinet Fouquet, L'Objet d'Art, June 1992, p. 74).