SECOND HALF 18TH CENTURY

This reverse-painted mirror reflects the mid-18th century European mania for China and the Orient, which popularised not only reverse-painted mirrors, but wallpaper panels, lacquer and ivory furniture, and other exotic furnishings and objets, many of which were imported by the East India companies.
It became de rigeur in fashionable homes to create fantasy 'Chinese' interiors, and British architects, cabinet-makers and designers such as Thomas Chippendale, William Chambers and William and John Linnell promoted the craze through their publications. They were able to supply appropriate furnishings, such as the 4th Duke of Beaufort's 'Chinese' bedroom at Badminton House, Gloucestershire, furnished by William and John Linnell in 1750, and the remarkable state bedroom furnished in 1771 with green and gilt-japanned furniture at Sir Rowland Winn's Nostell Priory, Yorkshire.
This superb reverse-painted mirror, and the following lot, belonged to Sir James Horlick, 4th Baronet (d. 1972), whose family had invented the malted drink bearing their name. He assembled a notable collection of 18th-century English furniture and had a particular passion for Chinese design. The collection included a remarkable group of reverse-painted mirrors, many of which were sold at auction in 2007, as well as 18th-century japanned and lacquer furniture. The collection furnished Achamore House, his home on the tiny Isle of Gigha in the Scottish Western Isles three miles off the mainland and was featured in a 1958 Connoisseur article devoted to the collection entitled 'Chinoiserie in the Western Isles, the Collection of Sir James and Lady Horlick'.
A Chinese mirror painting in the Gerstenfeld Collection directly corresponds to this grouping of figures, illustrated in E. Lennox-Boyd, ed., Masterpieces of English Furniture: The Gerstenfeld Collection, London, 1998, p. 65, fig. 49. Although, interestingly, the figures are painted in reverse to this example and the architecture in the background is different, as is the lady's attire. A closely related example depicting a lakeside view with a seated lady beneath a tree attended by a musician playing a flute sold at Christie's, London, 18 November 2010, lot 7 (£49,250 including premium).