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Lot Essay
The distinctive outline of this table, with its compact form, delicately drawn floral marquetry spray to the top with green-stained and ivory-inlaid details combined with a rich combination of woods, relates it closely to the work of Johann Friedrich (b. 1726) and Heinrich Wilhelm (b. 1738) Spindler, members of a celebrated dynasty of cabinet-makers. A closely related occasional table by the Spindler brothers, executed circa 1765-8 for the Neue Palais, Potsdam-Sanssouci, is illustrated in H. Kreisel, Die Kunst des Deutschen Mbels, Munich, 1986, vol. II, fig. 797. Another closely related table, with virtually identical mounts, was sold Christie's New York, 24 March, 1994, lot 196. The interior of the latter table is inlaid with a portrait medallion, possibly of Queen Elizabeth Christine of Prussia (1715-1797). It is possible that the oval mother-of-pearl panels on the table offered here originally contained similar portrait medallions.
The Spindlers were among the most celebrated cabinet-makers working in Germany in the rococo period. Starting their career working at the court of Bayreuth, they moved in 1764 to Potsdam, possibly on the recommendation of the Margrfin Wilhelmina of Bayreuth, who was Frederick the Great's favourite sister. Frederick was embarking on a lavish programme of redecorating the palaces of Potsdam in the latest rococo taste, and the Spindler brothers executed a number of virtuoso pieces, sumptuously decorated in tortoiseshell, mother-of-pearl and bronze mounts supplied by Johann Melchior Kambli. Another related occasional table by the Spindler brothers, richly inlaid with mother-of-pearl marquetry on a tortoiseshell ground in a similar manner to the Potsdam pieces, is in the James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor.
The Spindlers were among the most celebrated cabinet-makers working in Germany in the rococo period. Starting their career working at the court of Bayreuth, they moved in 1764 to Potsdam, possibly on the recommendation of the Margrfin Wilhelmina of Bayreuth, who was Frederick the Great's favourite sister. Frederick was embarking on a lavish programme of redecorating the palaces of Potsdam in the latest rococo taste, and the Spindler brothers executed a number of virtuoso pieces, sumptuously decorated in tortoiseshell, mother-of-pearl and bronze mounts supplied by Johann Melchior Kambli. Another related occasional table by the Spindler brothers, richly inlaid with mother-of-pearl marquetry on a tortoiseshell ground in a similar manner to the Potsdam pieces, is in the James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor.