PROBABLY GENOA OR TURIN CIRCA 1730-40, THE MIRROR PLATE PROBABLY ORIGINAL

This mirror’s shield-form coupled with the double frame suggests that it was manufactured in the central or northern parts of the Italian peninsula. Such frames were particularly fashionable in Tuscany, Venice, Piedmont, and Liguria. The clear French influence on this lot helps us to further narrow down the place of origin to those regions with strong cultural and economic ties to France, such as Turin and Genoa. The more robust carving and the inclusion of a female mask in the cresting is more typical to Piedmont, where the Savoyard court had an affinity for French art and local designers and craftsmen emulated the works of their French counterparts such as Le Pautre. One of their often-used decorative elements was indeed the female mask as it can be seen in a number of console tables, see E. Colle, Il Mobile Barocco in Italia, Milan, 2000, pp. 422-426 and E. Colle, Il Mobile Rococò in Italia, Milan, 2003, p. 463, as well as mirrors, see V. Viale, ed., Mostra del Barocco Piemontese, Turin, 1963, fig. 254 and A. Pedrini, Il Mobilio: Gli Ambienti e le Decorazioni nei Secoli XVII e XVIII in Piemonte, Turin, 1953, p. 90, fig. 144.