A SET OF NINE LOUIS XVI PAINTED PANELS

LATE 18TH CENTURY

Details

A SET OF NINE LOUIS XVI PAINTED PANELS
late 18th century
Oil on canvas, each with scenes depicting figures in landscapes and at the seashore in various pursuits within oval reserves and ribbon-tied foliate borders hanging from a bacchic mask supporting ribbons and garland within a ribbon-twist foliate frame, the pendant panels decorated with shell-form brackets supporting shells and corals
One panel of three sections 108in.(274cm.) high by 193in. (527cm) wide; one central panel 107in. (272cm.) high by 48in. (122cm.) wide; one central panel 107in. (272cm.) high by 45in. (104cm.) wide; two border panels 107in. (272cm.) high by 22in. (56cm.) wide; one border panel 107in. (272cm.) high by 25in. (63.5cm.) wide; two central panels each with one border panel 94in. (239cm.) high by 55in. (140cm.) wide; one central panel 95in. (241cm.) high by 42½in. (108cm.) wide (9)

Lot Essay

The present panels belong to a revival of painted decoration from the 1770s witnessed in the work of such artists as Charles-Louis Clérisseau who designed the decorative scheme for the salon of the hôtel Grimod de la Reynière. An arabesque wall panel executed circa 1780-1785, with mythological figures enclosed within round frames is close to the present panels in its general arrangement and details (illustrated in J. Whitehead, The French Interior in the Eighteenth Century, 1992, p. 106).