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Lot Essay
Claude Montigny, maître in 1766.
This striking encrier, with its very pronounced Greek-key frieze mounts, is an early example of a small-scale item in the so-called goût grec style, the early phase of French neo-classicism, which developed fully in the late 1750s / early 1760s.
Around 1754-‘56, the first experimental items of furniture in this style were conceived and produced, notably the great ebony bureau plat made for Ange-Laurent Lalive de Jully, probably by Joseph Baumhauer (died 1772) and Philippe Caffiéri (1714-1774) to the designs of Louis-Joseph Le Lorrain (1714-1759), which is now at the Musée Condé at Chantilly (S. Eriksen, Early neo-classicism in France, London 1974, figs. 85-89). Illustrated in in F.J.B. Watson, Louis XVI Furniture, London, 1973, cat. 109., is another bureau of this type. This desk, formerly in the collection of baron Anthony de Rothschild, has a related Greek-key frieze to the present inkstand. Claude Montigny, who stamped the present encrier, was one of the first ébénistes to embrace the ‘goût grec’ fashion and produced several bureau plats decorated with a Greek-key frieze, generally in parquetry; occasionally with a matching encrier. An inkstand of similar shape also in amaranth but with Vitruvian scroll mounts, formerly in the collection of Clare, Duchess of Sutherland (d.1998) was sold Christie's, London, 6 July 2006, lot 36. An oval example, formerly in the collection of Water Lees, was sold at Christie’s, London, 16 July 2010, lot 17.
This striking encrier, with its very pronounced Greek-key frieze mounts, is an early example of a small-scale item in the so-called goût grec style, the early phase of French neo-classicism, which developed fully in the late 1750s / early 1760s.
Around 1754-‘56, the first experimental items of furniture in this style were conceived and produced, notably the great ebony bureau plat made for Ange-Laurent Lalive de Jully, probably by Joseph Baumhauer (died 1772) and Philippe Caffiéri (1714-1774) to the designs of Louis-Joseph Le Lorrain (1714-1759), which is now at the Musée Condé at Chantilly (S. Eriksen, Early neo-classicism in France, London 1974, figs. 85-89). Illustrated in in F.J.B. Watson, Louis XVI Furniture, London, 1973, cat. 109., is another bureau of this type. This desk, formerly in the collection of baron Anthony de Rothschild, has a related Greek-key frieze to the present inkstand. Claude Montigny, who stamped the present encrier, was one of the first ébénistes to embrace the ‘goût grec’ fashion and produced several bureau plats decorated with a Greek-key frieze, generally in parquetry; occasionally with a matching encrier. An inkstand of similar shape also in amaranth but with Vitruvian scroll mounts, formerly in the collection of Clare, Duchess of Sutherland (d.1998) was sold Christie's, London, 6 July 2006, lot 36. An oval example, formerly in the collection of Water Lees, was sold at Christie’s, London, 16 July 2010, lot 17.