拍品專文
This chimneypiece is designed in the Roman or antique style promoted by James Gibbs' Book of Architecture, 1727, and is embellished with Venus's shell badge emerging from Roman foliage and flowered with acanthus in its tablet corners. Voluted trusses surmount the side pilasters, while the truss-buttressed tablet, displayed beneath the richly moulded cornice, is hung with the nature-goddess' ribbon-tied garlands. However, with the richly carved echinous egg-and-dart moulding framing the hearth, it also relates to patterns in Edward Hoppus's, Gentleman and Builder's Repository, 1737, (pl. XLVIII).
This chimneypiece was almost certainly carved by the emigré Mason Daniel Harvey (Hervé) (d.1737). Born in France, Harvey had already worked for James Gibbs at the Octagon House, Twickenham, interestingly alongside the joiner Charles Griffiths who was later responsible for the 'wainscott [of] the Gallery at Stainborough (Wentworth Castle) as Desined by Mr. Gibbs'. Of the five craftsman recorded in the Wentworth accounts only Harvey is listed as a carver, supplying as early as 1720 '4 capitals after ye corinthian order' for the Gallery and it is to him that the richest martial trophies and floral garlands of the East façade are also given (Brit. Lib. (Wentworth) Strafford Add. Mss. 22239-128).
This chimneypiece was almost certainly carved by the emigré Mason Daniel Harvey (Hervé) (d.1737). Born in France, Harvey had already worked for James Gibbs at the Octagon House, Twickenham, interestingly alongside the joiner Charles Griffiths who was later responsible for the 'wainscott [of] the Gallery at Stainborough (Wentworth Castle) as Desined by Mr. Gibbs'. Of the five craftsman recorded in the Wentworth accounts only Harvey is listed as a carver, supplying as early as 1720 '4 capitals after ye corinthian order' for the Gallery and it is to him that the richest martial trophies and floral garlands of the East façade are also given (Brit. Lib. (Wentworth) Strafford Add. Mss. 22239-128).