A NORTH ITALIAN WALNUT BUREAU-BOOKCASE

MID-18TH CENTURY, VENETO

Details

A NORTH ITALIAN WALNUT BUREAU-BOOKCASE
Mid-18th Century, Veneto
The arched moulded crest surmounted by baskets of flowers and flanked by C-scrolls, floral trails and with lambrequin drapery, above two shaped and arched doors with bevelled mirror plates surmounted by berainesque carvings and enclosing a fitted interior with eight panelled drawers flanked by six folio compartments, surmounted by a single compartment and above eight arched and foliate carved pigeon-holes, above two panelled slides and the middle-section with a sloping writing-flap with a shaped cabochon to the front, enclosing a fitted and shaped interior with four drawers and two compartments and a sliding lid, concealing nine variously-sized drawers, the lower section with three shaped long drawers flanked by grotesque masks issuing a chain-link and above the shaped plinth and claw feet, The reverse with two exhibition labels inscribed 'IL SETTECENTO ITALIANO VENEZIA - 1929 A.VII 000497' and '000499', respectively, and with further label inscribed 'N58 54', the interior later lined with red velvet
104 in. (264 cm.) high; 65 in. (165 cm.) wide; 32 in. (81 cm.) deep

Provenance

Commandante Arturo Diena, Padova.

Literature

G. Morazzoni, Il Mobile Veneziano del '700, Milan, 1958, plate CCCLXXVII.

Exhibited

Venice, 1929, Il Settecento Italiano.

Lot Essay

This magnificent bureau-cabinet, serpentined in the 18th Century 'picturesque' manner, is richly ornamented in celebration of 'peace and plenty' and the 'triumph of Venus', the nature goddess. The flower-baskets deck, the lambrequined plinth and angles of its ogival-swept pediment, are wrapped with Roman foliage. The deity's shell-badges emerge from the foliated cornice above its mirrored and triumphal-arched doors. The bureau's cabriole legs buttress its cut-cornered and sarcophagus-scrolled chest. They terminate in palm-wrapped 'bacchic' lion-paws and display satyrs' masks, that are ring-tamed by love.

This bombé bureau-cabinet is in shape related to that of a bureau-cabinet in the collection of E. Forti, Venice, illustrated in S. Colombo, L'Arte del Mobile in Italia, Milan, 1975, ill. 236, and was possibly executed by the same cabinet maker, as the lower section of the bureau is treated in a very similar manner. The carved satyr's mask, which is rather atypical in Venetian furniture, is, however, not found on the latter model. Another related but simpler bureau-cabinet, is illustrated in W. T. de Gregory, Vecchi Mobili Italiani, Milano, 1978, p. 154, ill. 149.

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