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Lot Essay
The 'C' couronné poinçon was a tax mark used on any alloy containing copper between March 1745 and February 1749.
With their naturalistic oak-leaf branches entwined with a boar and a stag, these wall-lights reflect the Louis XV pittoresque style in its purest form, while their hunting subjects reflect the passion for la chasse at the court of Louis XV. Such elaborate and ambitious types of objects were executed by various bronziers in the 1740s and 1750s, including the orfèvre and fondeur du Roi Jean-Claude Duplessis père (1699-1774) as well as the famed Jacques Caffieri (1678-1755), and promoted by marchands-merciers such as Lazare Duvaux. A number of Louis XV and Louis XVI ormolu objects featuring hounds, boars, stags, hunters and other attributes of this noble pastime are known. These include a pair of Louis XVI chenets by Quentin-Claude Pitoin in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (acc. nos.. 1977.102.5 and 1977.102.6); a Louis XV pair in the Rhösska Museum in Göteborg (inv. RKM 5:a-1951 and RKM 5:b-1951); and a pair of wall-lights sold Christie’s, London, 12-13 January 2005, lot 392. The inventory prepared upon Caffieri’s death in 1755 also lists a pair of chenets cast with hound figures: “un autre modèle de garniture de gril représentant d’un côté un chasseur lançant un épieu sur un sanglier et de l’autre une amazone et deux chiens.” Furthermore, hunt-themed works by Caffieri are known to have been to delivered to the duchess of Parma, daughter of Louis XV. These include chenets, one of which is signed by Caffieri, now in the Quirinale, Rome, (A. González-Palacios, Il Patrimonio Artistico del Quirinale: I Mobili Francesi, Milan, 1996, pp. 264-267, cat. nos. 67-68). A closely related pair of wall-lights, with hounds chasing boar among oak leaves, previously in the Patiño collection, was sold from the collection of Jerrold Perenchio; Christie's, New York, 1-16 September 2020, lot 171 ($68,750). A further pair of wall-lights sculpted with a stag's head and oak leaves by Jean-Joseph de Saint-Germain is illustrated in H. Ottomeyer and P. Pröschl, et al, Vergoldete Bronzen, I, Munich, 1986, p. 109, fig. 2.2.5.
With their naturalistic oak-leaf branches entwined with a boar and a stag, these wall-lights reflect the Louis XV pittoresque style in its purest form, while their hunting subjects reflect the passion for la chasse at the court of Louis XV. Such elaborate and ambitious types of objects were executed by various bronziers in the 1740s and 1750s, including the orfèvre and fondeur du Roi Jean-Claude Duplessis père (1699-1774) as well as the famed Jacques Caffieri (1678-1755), and promoted by marchands-merciers such as Lazare Duvaux. A number of Louis XV and Louis XVI ormolu objects featuring hounds, boars, stags, hunters and other attributes of this noble pastime are known. These include a pair of Louis XVI chenets by Quentin-Claude Pitoin in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (acc. nos.. 1977.102.5 and 1977.102.6); a Louis XV pair in the Rhösska Museum in Göteborg (inv. RKM 5:a-1951 and RKM 5:b-1951); and a pair of wall-lights sold Christie’s, London, 12-13 January 2005, lot 392. The inventory prepared upon Caffieri’s death in 1755 also lists a pair of chenets cast with hound figures: “un autre modèle de garniture de gril représentant d’un côté un chasseur lançant un épieu sur un sanglier et de l’autre une amazone et deux chiens.” Furthermore, hunt-themed works by Caffieri are known to have been to delivered to the duchess of Parma, daughter of Louis XV. These include chenets, one of which is signed by Caffieri, now in the Quirinale, Rome, (A. González-Palacios, Il Patrimonio Artistico del Quirinale: I Mobili Francesi, Milan, 1996, pp. 264-267, cat. nos. 67-68). A closely related pair of wall-lights, with hounds chasing boar among oak leaves, previously in the Patiño collection, was sold from the collection of Jerrold Perenchio; Christie's, New York, 1-16 September 2020, lot 171 ($68,750). A further pair of wall-lights sculpted with a stag's head and oak leaves by Jean-Joseph de Saint-Germain is illustrated in H. Ottomeyer and P. Pröschl, et al, Vergoldete Bronzen, I, Munich, 1986, p. 109, fig. 2.2.5.