Lot Essay
Charles Topino, maître in 1773.
This table's distinctive trompe l'oeil marquetry, inspired by Chinese coromandel lacquer screens, was popularised by the ébéniste Charles Topino, of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Topino specialized in 'sujets chinois' and 'poeteries chinoises' in the manner seen on lacquered screens, and he listed such marquetry during the 1770s in his Livre-journal.
Related tables in the Royal Ontario Museum and the Detroit Institute of Art are illustrated in S. Barbier Sainte Maire, 'Charles Topino', L'Objet d'Art, October 1999 (figs. 6 and 23), while another very similar table stamped by Topino is illustrated in N. de Reyniés, Le Mobilier Domestique, Paris, 1987, p. 350, ill. 1250.
Interestingly, this characteristic style was also adopted by Topino's brother-in-law, J. Manser of Alsace, who stamped a virtually identical table sold anonymously at Sotheby's London, 13 June 2001, lot 306.
This table's distinctive trompe l'oeil marquetry, inspired by Chinese coromandel lacquer screens, was popularised by the ébéniste Charles Topino, of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Topino specialized in 'sujets chinois' and 'poeteries chinoises' in the manner seen on lacquered screens, and he listed such marquetry during the 1770s in his Livre-journal.
Related tables in the Royal Ontario Museum and the Detroit Institute of Art are illustrated in S. Barbier Sainte Maire, 'Charles Topino', L'Objet d'Art, October 1999 (figs. 6 and 23), while another very similar table stamped by Topino is illustrated in N. de Reyniés, Le Mobilier Domestique, Paris, 1987, p. 350, ill. 1250.
Interestingly, this characteristic style was also adopted by Topino's brother-in-law, J. Manser of Alsace, who stamped a virtually identical table sold anonymously at Sotheby's London, 13 June 2001, lot 306.