A LOUIS XVI ORMOLU-MOUNTED AND BRASS-INLAID AMARANTH SECRETAIRE-A-ABATTANT
THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN 
A LOUIS XVI ORMOLU-MOUNTED AND BRASS-INLAID AMARANTH SECRETAIRE-A-ABATTANT

CIRCA 1775

细节
A LOUIS XVI ORMOLU-MOUNTED AND BRASS-INLAID AMARANTH SECRETAIRE-A-ABATTANT
CIRCA 1775
The brèche marble top with breakfront corners above a frieze decorated with brass flutings and a fall front enclosing nineteen drawers and a leather box, above two doors enclosing six drawers, the canted front angles and the back angles headed by capitals with acanthus and brass fluting, the sides divided in panels with leaf tip frame, on spirally-turned feet, restorations to veneers, the lower section originally with a coffre-fort
53½ in. (136 cm.) high; 43 in. (110 cm.) wide; 18¼ in. (46 cm.) deep
来源
Christie's, London, 7 July 2005, lot 331 (£54,000 with premium).

荣誉呈献

Celia Harvey
Celia Harvey

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拍品专文

With its distinctive bold and masculine shape, this secrétaire reflects the fashionable goût grec which first developed in the late 1750s. It relates to the oeuvre of Pierre Garnier (1726-1806) who was one of the precursors of this new style and was immediately inspired by the celebrated bureau plat made by Joseph Baumhauer for Ange-Laurent Lalive de Jully, now at the Musée Condé at Chantilly (S. Eriksen, Early Neo-Classicism in France, London, 1974, figs. 85-89).
The structure with canted angles embellished with bold fluting headed by classical capitals and terminating in toupie feet also figures on a commode by Garnier which is illustrated in C. Huchet de Quénetain, Pierre Garnier, Paris, 2003, p. 129. A somewhat similar secrétaire, with plain bois satiné veneers embellished with restrained mounts, previously in the collection of the baron de Rédé, is illustrated in A. Pradère, French Furniture Makers, London, 1989, p. 251 fig. 260.
The specific design of the spirally turned ormolu feet was often used on Garnier's goût grec pieces. This element harks back to the Louis XIV style as illustrated by many such examples of spirally-fluted feet in the oeuvre of André-Charles Boulle.