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Lot Essay
Beautifully inlaid with 'Boulle' marquetry motifs in the arabesque manner of Jean I Bérain, this playful bureau mazarin closely relates to a number of prestigious pieces attributed to Bernard I Van Risenburgh. Like its pendant in contre-partie in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (acc. 372-1901(1980)), this bureau is emblematic of the appetite for masterpieces of French decorative arts among English connoisseurs in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Indeed, the present lot was among the Vernon-Harcourt heirlooms at Buxted Park, East Sussex and has remained in the family until the present day.
This bureau mazarin belongs to a small and prestigious corpus of lavishly and expensively decorated bureaux with similar polychrome-stained horn, mother-of-pearl and tortoiseshell. The pendant to this desk in contre-partie is currently preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London and with the exception of the central apron presents identical decoration and form to the present lot. The V&A bureau was similarly in an English collection and belonged to Charles Spencer Ricketts (1788-1867) at Dorton House, Buckinghamshire. The English taste for such pieces might also be demonstrated by a closely related desk almost certainly from the same workshop, of similar outline and decoration but of much smaller size and decorated with the Retz coats-of-arms in the Royal Collection, thought to have been acquired by George III for Queen Charlotte (RCIN 39213). A further related example of larger size is preserved in Saltram, Devon (NT 871294) and is said to have been in the collection of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough. The most celebrated and sumptuous example from this corpus, of similar form and closely related decoration to the present lot but of slightly smaller size, is the bureau made for Maximilien II Emmanuel, Elector of Bavaria and delivered after 1715, currently preserved in the Getty Museum, Los Angeles (inv. no. 87.DA.77).
BVRB I
Father of the celebrated ébéniste Bernard II van Risenburgh, Bernard I came from Groningen in Holland before settling in Paris in 1696 where he became Master ébéniste before 1722. He seems to have specialised in the production of bracket clock cases in Boulle marquetry as revealed by the inventory of his stock made in 1738 which only listed clocks. However, the important corpus of pieces including the present lot are now attributed to Bernard I (discussed by Jean-Nérée Ronfort and Jean-Dominique Augarde in their article ‘Le Maître du bureau de l'Electeur’ L'Estampille, January 1991, pp. 42-74); interestingly a commode with related polychrome ‘Boulle’ marquetry decoration in the collection of the Marquess of Bath at Longleat bears the stamp ‘BVRB’, indicating it was completed by BVRB I’s son, Bernard II.
BUXTED PARK
This bureau mazarin was in the collection at Buxted Park, a house and collection which for 150 years passed almost exclusively through the female line. A letter found in the desk addressed to Sir George Augustus Shuckburgh-Evelyn, 6th Baronet suggests that the bureau was at Buxted when the house was owned by his wife Julia Annabelle Shuckburgh-Evelyn, a wealthy heiress who had inherited the house from her uncle George Medley, a member of parliament who had amassed a considerable fortune as a wine merchant in Portugal. George Medley (1720-1796) had completed the mansion at Buxted which had been begun by his own uncle Edward Medley in 1725. The bureau mazarin then passed to Julia Evelyn Medley Shuckburgh-Evelyn who married Charles Jenkinson, 3rd Earl of Liverpool (1784-1851). A young Princess Victoria was a regular visitor to Buxted at this time and became close friends with the young Lady Catherine Jenkinson who would go on to marry Francis Vernon-Harcourt. On 15 February 1845 the then Queen Victoria visited Buxted and was received by Lord Liverpool and Lady Catherine Harcourt, noting the preservation of the house’s collection and writing in her journal ‘It put me much in mind of former times; nothing seemed changed; every piece of furniture, almost every book was an old acquaintance, & everything in the same place.’
Lady Catherine Vernon-Harcourt inherited Buxted and its contents in 1851 and after her death the bureau mazarin descended to the collection of the 3rd Viscount Portman (1860-1923) as part of the Vernon-Harcourt heirlooms that were inherited with Buxted Park. The bureau mazarin was recorded as part of this inheritance in 1925 by which time it had been moved to Ladywell, a seaside residence in Bournemouth of Viscount Portman’s widow.
This bureau mazarin belongs to a small and prestigious corpus of lavishly and expensively decorated bureaux with similar polychrome-stained horn, mother-of-pearl and tortoiseshell. The pendant to this desk in contre-partie is currently preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London and with the exception of the central apron presents identical decoration and form to the present lot. The V&A bureau was similarly in an English collection and belonged to Charles Spencer Ricketts (1788-1867) at Dorton House, Buckinghamshire. The English taste for such pieces might also be demonstrated by a closely related desk almost certainly from the same workshop, of similar outline and decoration but of much smaller size and decorated with the Retz coats-of-arms in the Royal Collection, thought to have been acquired by George III for Queen Charlotte (RCIN 39213). A further related example of larger size is preserved in Saltram, Devon (NT 871294) and is said to have been in the collection of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough. The most celebrated and sumptuous example from this corpus, of similar form and closely related decoration to the present lot but of slightly smaller size, is the bureau made for Maximilien II Emmanuel, Elector of Bavaria and delivered after 1715, currently preserved in the Getty Museum, Los Angeles (inv. no. 87.DA.77).
BVRB I
Father of the celebrated ébéniste Bernard II van Risenburgh, Bernard I came from Groningen in Holland before settling in Paris in 1696 where he became Master ébéniste before 1722. He seems to have specialised in the production of bracket clock cases in Boulle marquetry as revealed by the inventory of his stock made in 1738 which only listed clocks. However, the important corpus of pieces including the present lot are now attributed to Bernard I (discussed by Jean-Nérée Ronfort and Jean-Dominique Augarde in their article ‘Le Maître du bureau de l'Electeur’ L'Estampille, January 1991, pp. 42-74); interestingly a commode with related polychrome ‘Boulle’ marquetry decoration in the collection of the Marquess of Bath at Longleat bears the stamp ‘BVRB’, indicating it was completed by BVRB I’s son, Bernard II.
BUXTED PARK
This bureau mazarin was in the collection at Buxted Park, a house and collection which for 150 years passed almost exclusively through the female line. A letter found in the desk addressed to Sir George Augustus Shuckburgh-Evelyn, 6th Baronet suggests that the bureau was at Buxted when the house was owned by his wife Julia Annabelle Shuckburgh-Evelyn, a wealthy heiress who had inherited the house from her uncle George Medley, a member of parliament who had amassed a considerable fortune as a wine merchant in Portugal. George Medley (1720-1796) had completed the mansion at Buxted which had been begun by his own uncle Edward Medley in 1725. The bureau mazarin then passed to Julia Evelyn Medley Shuckburgh-Evelyn who married Charles Jenkinson, 3rd Earl of Liverpool (1784-1851). A young Princess Victoria was a regular visitor to Buxted at this time and became close friends with the young Lady Catherine Jenkinson who would go on to marry Francis Vernon-Harcourt. On 15 February 1845 the then Queen Victoria visited Buxted and was received by Lord Liverpool and Lady Catherine Harcourt, noting the preservation of the house’s collection and writing in her journal ‘It put me much in mind of former times; nothing seemed changed; every piece of furniture, almost every book was an old acquaintance, & everything in the same place.’
Lady Catherine Vernon-Harcourt inherited Buxted and its contents in 1851 and after her death the bureau mazarin descended to the collection of the 3rd Viscount Portman (1860-1923) as part of the Vernon-Harcourt heirlooms that were inherited with Buxted Park. The bureau mazarin was recorded as part of this inheritance in 1925 by which time it had been moved to Ladywell, a seaside residence in Bournemouth of Viscount Portman’s widow.