THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN (LOTS 119, 124, 147-8 AND 163-8) Sir Francis Watson, KCVO, FBA, FSA, (1907-1992) was Director of the Wallace Collection from 1963 until 1974 during which time he consolidated his great reputation as a leading authority on the arts of France and Italy in the 18th Century. His 1956 Catalogue of Furniture in the Wallace Collection had already received international acclaim and broke new ground in the field of serious catalogues of objects other than painting and sculpture. Between 1966 and 1970 he wrote his meticulous catalogue of the Wrightsman Collection in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. He also wrote books on Canaletto, Tiepolo and Fragonard. He was Surveyor of the Queen’s Works of Art, Slade Professor of Fine Art at Oxford (1969-70), Wrightsman Professor at New York University (1970-71), Kress Professor at the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. (1975-76), and was awarded the Gold Medal of New York University in 1966.

Charles de Wailly (Paris 1730-1798)

Design for a wall decoration with a fountain and two stoves

Details

Charles de Wailly (Paris 1730-1798)
Design for a wall decoration with a fountain and two stoves
inscribed 'Coupe du SALON, sur la fontaine et sur le poële.'
black chalk, pen and black ink, grey and brown wash, watermark BLAUW, countermark shield
19½ x 21 in. (49.5 x 54 cm.)

Provenance

F.J.B Watson; and thence by descent to the present owner.

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Lot Essay

The attribution to de Wailly was confirmed in a letter to Sir Francis Watson from Monique Mosser on 1 May 1990. She noted that some of the features reappear in other drawings by the artist, such as the console table which is similar to that in de Wailly's designs for the Hôtel d’Argenson, or the globe which is related to one in de Wailly's plans for the Hôtel de Gave (The Hermitage, Saint Petersburg). The closest decorative programme known by de Wailly is that for the main Salon of the Palazzo Spinola in Genoa and so Mosser suggested that the present drawing may be a first idea for that project, in which the architectural orders are still Ionic and not yet Corinthian, as they appear in the final scheme. A drawing which appears to relate to the same project was sold at Millon et Cie., Paris, on 26 June 2008, lot 84, where it was given to Gilles-Paul Cauvet (1731-1788).

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