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Lot Essay
The goldsmith Andrew Fogelberg (1732-1815), also identified as Anders Fogelberg, was born in Sweden in 1732 and apprenticed to a goldsmith in Halmsted in 1746. He is thought to have come to England from Sweden around 1770, however, the marriage of an Andrew Fogelberg to Elizabeth Hebert is recorded at St. Ann's Soho in 1766. It was at this church that Andrew Fogelberg was to marry Susanna Walker (d.1818) in 1793. Elizabeth Hebert was possibly the widow of the Huguenot goldmsith Henry Hebert (d.1764). In 1793 Fogelberg is recorded as a plateworker in Church Street, Soho in 1773. By 1780 he was in partnership with Stephen Gilbert, who had been apprenticed to Edward Wakelin in 1752. From their address at 29 Church Street, St Ann's, Soho, the output of this partnership was of exceptional quality and a restrained classical nature, highlighted by the use of small cameo medallions. This was also a characteristic of contemporary Swedish decoration as Charles Oman has pointed out ('Andrew Fogelberg, and the English influence on Swedish silver', Apollo, June 1947, pp.158-60) although medallions had been used there as decorative devices since the previous century.
The medallions in the present lot, as on most of the firms output, are probably after glass paste gems by James Tassie. Tassie, a modeller and reproducer of antique gems, supplied casts to Wedgwood and Bentley; N. M. Penzer notes (Paul Storr, 1954, p. 55-56) that he supplied most of the cameos and intaglios in Wedgwood's 1773 catalogue. Tassie's address, at Compton Street, second door from Greek Street, was for some five years just behind Fogelberg's workshop before his partnership with Gilbert (Tassie moved to Leicester Fields in 1778) and this proximity cannot fail to have influenced the decoration of Fogelberg's already neo-classical designs.
The designs of most of these cameos were also reproduced in paste by Wedgwood and Bentley who were supplied with casts by Flaxman and Hackwood as well as Tassie, indicating a common source, probably source books of ancient themes.
The medallions in the present lot, as on most of the firms output, are probably after glass paste gems by James Tassie. Tassie, a modeller and reproducer of antique gems, supplied casts to Wedgwood and Bentley; N. M. Penzer notes (Paul Storr, 1954, p. 55-56) that he supplied most of the cameos and intaglios in Wedgwood's 1773 catalogue. Tassie's address, at Compton Street, second door from Greek Street, was for some five years just behind Fogelberg's workshop before his partnership with Gilbert (Tassie moved to Leicester Fields in 1778) and this proximity cannot fail to have influenced the decoration of Fogelberg's already neo-classical designs.
The designs of most of these cameos were also reproduced in paste by Wedgwood and Bentley who were supplied with casts by Flaxman and Hackwood as well as Tassie, indicating a common source, probably source books of ancient themes.