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Lot Essay
The ormolu-enriched fender incorporates a pair of 'chenets' in the late 18th Century French 'antique' or 'Egyptian' manner and displays models of the Egyptian lions of the Capitoline Museum. Their 'altar' pedestals are enriched with bas relief trophies, symbolising the Element of Fire, and comprise bacchic masks framed by Jupiter's Egyptian-winged 'fulcrum' or thunderbolt.
Related 'sphinx' chenets were executed by the Parisian bronze-founder, Pierre Philippe Thomire, after models by the sculptor Louis Simon Boizot, while this same 'lion' model featured on chenets supplied in 1806 by André-Antoine Ravrio (d. 1806) for Fontainbleau Palace, and on a fender supplied in 1805 by the bronze-founder Claude Galle for the Grand Trianon, Versailles (J.-P. Samoyault, Pendules et bronzes d'ameublement entrés sous le Premier Empire, Paris, 1989, p. 255, cat. no. 254 and H. Ottomeyer, P. Pröschel et al., Vergoldete Bronzen, Munich, 1986, vol. I, figs 5.4.6. and 5.4.5.). A related fender was also introduced by Samuel Whitbread II (d. 1816) in the French-fashioned apartments created for Mrs. Whitbread at Southill, Bedfordshire. It was listed as a 'very rich Metal fender with bronze Lions and Ormolu Ornaments', in the 1816 inventory (F.J.B. Watson, 'The Furniture and Decoration', Southill. A Regency House, London, 1951, p. 27, fig. 23).
Related 'sphinx' chenets were executed by the Parisian bronze-founder, Pierre Philippe Thomire, after models by the sculptor Louis Simon Boizot, while this same 'lion' model featured on chenets supplied in 1806 by André-Antoine Ravrio (d. 1806) for Fontainbleau Palace, and on a fender supplied in 1805 by the bronze-founder Claude Galle for the Grand Trianon, Versailles (J.-P. Samoyault, Pendules et bronzes d'ameublement entrés sous le Premier Empire, Paris, 1989, p. 255, cat. no. 254 and H. Ottomeyer, P. Pröschel et al., Vergoldete Bronzen, Munich, 1986, vol. I, figs 5.4.6. and 5.4.5.). A related fender was also introduced by Samuel Whitbread II (d. 1816) in the French-fashioned apartments created for Mrs. Whitbread at Southill, Bedfordshire. It was listed as a 'very rich Metal fender with bronze Lions and Ormolu Ornaments', in the 1816 inventory (F.J.B. Watson, 'The Furniture and Decoration', Southill. A Regency House, London, 1951, p. 27, fig. 23).