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Lot Essay
These magnificent wall-lights, with classically draped Arcadian nymph herms issuing delicately chased candle arms in the form of roses, the tapering backplates backed with blued steel issuing entwined triumphal myrtle and terminating in a Bacchic thyrsus finial, derive from a drawing of circa 1780 by the influential designer Jean-Louis Prieur (c. 1725-c. 1785) for a set of twenty wall-lights of slightly simpler design delivered to King Stanislaus-August Poniatowski of Poland for the Royal Palace in Warsaw.
Until recently it was thought that the set of twenty formed part of the first programme of redecoration at the palace undertaken by Stanislaus-August shortly after his accession to the throne in 1764, which included an impressive array of bronzes d'ameublement and furniture in the fashionable goût grec neoclassical style, much of which was supplied by Prieur and Philippe Caffiéri. Prieur alone was paid the huge sum of 57,500 livres for the designs he supplied for the project.
New documents recently discovered by Natalia Ladyka (Inventaire général des meubles et effets mobiliers qui sont dans le Château de Varsovie fait en mars 1795, Warsaw, 1997, pp. 29 and 142) prove that this particular set of wall-lights was actually conceived circa 1779, a date which is logical due to the more delicate, attenuated form of this model, reflecting the goût étrusque of the 1780's. The documents reveal that in 1779 the dimensions of the wall-lights were still being finalized, while in 1780 'les dix paires de bras et les deux grilles de cheminé sont commandés à Paris.' On 17 June 1781 Stanislaus-August's agent in Paris informed him that 'les feux sont achevés et de toute beauté...on s'occupe à force de terminer les bras.' The wall-lights were cast and chased in Paris, and then delivered to Warsaw where they were gilded by the doreur Brichman.
The set was later dispersed and copies were made at the end of the nineteenth century and beginning of the twentieth century, although a pair remains at the Royal Palace in Warsaw (illustrated in Maria Wanda Przewona, 'Bronzearbeiten a la Grecque- die Bestellungen des Warschauer Hofes in den Jahren 1766-1768' in Vergoldete Bronzen, Munich, 1986, vol. II.
Others from the group are recorded as follows :
Four pairs are in the Musée Nissim de Camondo, Paris, cat. nos. 12 and 40 (also illustrated in S. Eriksen, Early Neoclassicism in France, London, 1974, fig. 207)
One pair sold from the collection of Camillo Castiglioni, Amsterdam, 13-15 July 1926, lot 158
One pair sold from the collection of Baron Cassel van Doorn, Paris, Galerie Charpentier, 9 March 1954, lot 59
One pair (with patinated figures) sold from the Guiraud collection, Paris, 14 June 1956, lot 132
The provenance for the wall-lights offered here, which are of a richer model than the Warsaw set, remains tantalisingly unknown, but they must surely have formed part of a prestigious commission, and the superb quality of the chasing points to the most accomplished bronziers such as François Rémond (maître-doreur in 1774), Louis-Gabriel Feloix (maître in 1754), or Pierre-François Feuchère, all of whom produced work of such a refined, delicate style in the 1780's, often for Royal Commissions.
Until recently it was thought that the set of twenty formed part of the first programme of redecoration at the palace undertaken by Stanislaus-August shortly after his accession to the throne in 1764, which included an impressive array of bronzes d'ameublement and furniture in the fashionable goût grec neoclassical style, much of which was supplied by Prieur and Philippe Caffiéri. Prieur alone was paid the huge sum of 57,500 livres for the designs he supplied for the project.
New documents recently discovered by Natalia Ladyka (Inventaire général des meubles et effets mobiliers qui sont dans le Château de Varsovie fait en mars 1795, Warsaw, 1997, pp. 29 and 142) prove that this particular set of wall-lights was actually conceived circa 1779, a date which is logical due to the more delicate, attenuated form of this model, reflecting the goût étrusque of the 1780's. The documents reveal that in 1779 the dimensions of the wall-lights were still being finalized, while in 1780 'les dix paires de bras et les deux grilles de cheminé sont commandés à Paris.' On 17 June 1781 Stanislaus-August's agent in Paris informed him that 'les feux sont achevés et de toute beauté...on s'occupe à force de terminer les bras.' The wall-lights were cast and chased in Paris, and then delivered to Warsaw where they were gilded by the doreur Brichman.
The set was later dispersed and copies were made at the end of the nineteenth century and beginning of the twentieth century, although a pair remains at the Royal Palace in Warsaw (illustrated in Maria Wanda Przewona, 'Bronzearbeiten a la Grecque- die Bestellungen des Warschauer Hofes in den Jahren 1766-1768' in Vergoldete Bronzen, Munich, 1986, vol. II.
Others from the group are recorded as follows :
Four pairs are in the Musée Nissim de Camondo, Paris, cat. nos. 12 and 40 (also illustrated in S. Eriksen, Early Neoclassicism in France, London, 1974, fig. 207)
One pair sold from the collection of Camillo Castiglioni, Amsterdam, 13-15 July 1926, lot 158
One pair sold from the collection of Baron Cassel van Doorn, Paris, Galerie Charpentier, 9 March 1954, lot 59
One pair (with patinated figures) sold from the Guiraud collection, Paris, 14 June 1956, lot 132
The provenance for the wall-lights offered here, which are of a richer model than the Warsaw set, remains tantalisingly unknown, but they must surely have formed part of a prestigious commission, and the superb quality of the chasing points to the most accomplished bronziers such as François Rémond (maître-doreur in 1774), Louis-Gabriel Feloix (maître in 1754), or Pierre-François Feuchère, all of whom produced work of such a refined, delicate style in the 1780's, often for Royal Commissions.