Lot Essay
This richly carved statuary-marble chimneypiece, with its French-fashion polychromed ground of Sicilian jasper, is conceived in the George II Roman or antique manner promoted by Matthew Boulton. Beneath the moulded cornice, with its echinous egg-and-dart band, the freize is embellished with a lozenged-ribbon trellis flowered with Roman acanthus recalling a pattern popularised by W. Pain's, Builder's Companion and Workman's General Assistant, 1758, (p. 85), while the flanking tablets that display the sunflower badge of the Sun God Apollo and surmount the acanthus-wrapped and voluted trusses of the projecting pilasters, are enriched with imbricated and flowered patterae.
With its characteristic overlay of white statuary marble onto a Sicilian Jasper marble ground, this chimneypiece was almost certainly supplied by the sculptor Sir Henry Cheere (1703-81), whose yard was near St. Margaret's, Westminster. Although apprenticed as a sculptor to John Nost, Cheere is rightly celebrated for his chimneypieces, supplying such princely houses as Ditchley Park, Longford Castle, Kimbolton Castle and Kirtlington Park. A member of the committee of artists who met to discuss the scheme that resulted in the founding of the Royal Academy, Cheere was knighted by George III in 1760.
Related guilloche-trailed and foliate-headed voluted jambs headed by flowerheads featured on the George II siena and cararra marble chimneypiece supplied to Hugh, later 1st Duke of Northumberland for Northumberland House, London and sold by The Duke of Northumberland, K.G., K.C.V.O., P.C., T.D., F.R.S. in these Rooms, 17 November 1988, lot 99. It also displays an overlaid frieze, although with Vitruvian-scroll decoration.
With its characteristic overlay of white statuary marble onto a Sicilian Jasper marble ground, this chimneypiece was almost certainly supplied by the sculptor Sir Henry Cheere (1703-81), whose yard was near St. Margaret's, Westminster. Although apprenticed as a sculptor to John Nost, Cheere is rightly celebrated for his chimneypieces, supplying such princely houses as Ditchley Park, Longford Castle, Kimbolton Castle and Kirtlington Park. A member of the committee of artists who met to discuss the scheme that resulted in the founding of the Royal Academy, Cheere was knighted by George III in 1760.
Related guilloche-trailed and foliate-headed voluted jambs headed by flowerheads featured on the George II siena and cararra marble chimneypiece supplied to Hugh, later 1st Duke of Northumberland for Northumberland House, London and sold by The Duke of Northumberland, K.G., K.C.V.O., P.C., T.D., F.R.S. in these Rooms, 17 November 1988, lot 99. It also displays an overlaid frieze, although with Vitruvian-scroll decoration.