Russian School (late 18th Century)

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Russian School (late 18th Century)
Front and side view of a Throne designed in the Louis XVI manner for Emress Catherine II, 'Catherine the Great' of Russia (d.1796) and displaying her E cypher beneath Urania's starred diadem within a laurel-enriched oval medallion, that is framed by the ribbon of an unidentified Order, garlanded by flowers and held by the Imperial eagle. Addorsed eagles support the back, whose arched crest is surmounted by Minerva's plumed helmet, symbolising Wisdom. Her helmets cap the uprights to the arms, which are embellished with bacchic satyr-masks and orbs protected by bacchic lion-paws that emerge from acanthus-foilage. Minerva's plumes cap the scroll-hermed legs, and the apron, which is festooned which a rich drapery, displays a trophy, emblematic of good government and comprises laurels accompanying the serpent-twined mirror of Prudence and the all-seeing God's eye-capped wand pencil and watercolour
12½ x 7¼in.(318 x 184mm.); and 11¼ x 7½in.(286 x 191mm.)
(2)

Lot Essay

The role of the Empress as 'protectrice des arts', through for instance her establishment of the St. Petersburg Academie des Beaux-Arts, caused her to be represented as Minerva in Simon-Louis Boizot's 'Parnasse de Russie' centrepiece executed by Sevres in 1778.
The same termination of the arms features on a Russian rectangular-backed chair now in a New York private collection (see A. Cheneviere, Russian Furniture, London, 1988, fig. 56)

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