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Lot Essay
Jean Mathieu Chevallier, maître in 1743.
This commode, made around 1740-1745, is in the chinoiserie taste introduced in France for Louis XIV after the visit of the Siamese ambassador. The taste was popular until around 1760. The current commode may conceivably be the commode with two chinoiserie figures on the top drawer, mentioned in the inventory of Jean Mathieu Chevallier in 1766. Nearly identical chinoiserie figures appear on a commode in the National Gallery, Wiedener Collection C267, Washington.These types of figures called magots or pagodes, were also used by the Maître aux pagodes on commodes and bureaux such as these illustrated in Alexandre Pradère, 'Le Mâitre aux Pagodes, L'object d'Art' March 1991, n.29, figures 9 and 10. Examples of such magots and pagodas can be seen on the commode sold from the Collection of the late Joanne T Cummings, Christie's New York, 21 May 1996, lot 238 which was stamped by the marchand-ébénite Nöel Gérard. It is also interesting to compare the drawing of Chinese figures that decorate the boiseries in the cabinet chinois in the hôtel Maine in Paris, created by Robert de Cotte just before 1730 illustrated in Bruno Pons, Grands Décors Français, 1650-1800, 1995, édition Faton, Dijon, pages 36 and 37).
This commode, made around 1740-1745, is in the chinoiserie taste introduced in France for Louis XIV after the visit of the Siamese ambassador. The taste was popular until around 1760. The current commode may conceivably be the commode with two chinoiserie figures on the top drawer, mentioned in the inventory of Jean Mathieu Chevallier in 1766. Nearly identical chinoiserie figures appear on a commode in the National Gallery, Wiedener Collection C267, Washington.These types of figures called magots or pagodes, were also used by the Maître aux pagodes on commodes and bureaux such as these illustrated in Alexandre Pradère, 'Le Mâitre aux Pagodes, L'object d'Art' March 1991, n.29, figures 9 and 10. Examples of such magots and pagodas can be seen on the commode sold from the Collection of the late Joanne T Cummings, Christie's New York, 21 May 1996, lot 238 which was stamped by the marchand-ébénite Nöel Gérard. It is also interesting to compare the drawing of Chinese figures that decorate the boiseries in the cabinet chinois in the hôtel Maine in Paris, created by Robert de Cotte just before 1730 illustrated in Bruno Pons, Grands Décors Français, 1650-1800, 1995, édition Faton, Dijon, pages 36 and 37).