THE PROPERTY OF A PRIVATE COLLECTOR (lots 355-362)
A PAIR OF FRENCH CAST-IRON URNS
Details
A PAIR OF FRENCH CAST-IRON URNS
THIRD QUARTER 19TH CENTURY
Each of baluster form with raised handles cast with Janus hands and boar's masks, the sides with shells, Greek key and oak leaf decoration, on a fluted stem and square platform- 37in.(94cm.) high, 24in.(61cm.) wide, 18in.(46cm.) deep (2)
THIRD QUARTER 19TH CENTURY
Each of baluster form with raised handles cast with Janus hands and boar's masks, the sides with shells, Greek key and oak leaf decoration, on a fluted stem and square platform- 37in.(94cm.) high, 24in.(61cm.) wide, 18in.(46cm.) deep (2)
Literature
The Wallace Collection, Catalogue of Sculpture, (no. SA5-6), J. Davis, Antique Garden Ornament, 1991, pp. 133-141, plate 3:12
The offered lot is after on of thirteen different pairs of urns made for the marble parpets separating the Parterre du Nord from the Parterre du Midi at Versailles, where they are still in position. Claude Ballin (1615-1678), goldsmith to Louis XIV was commissioned to design the ensemble which were then modeled by Legendre, Magnière, Tuby and Anguier and cast bu Duval after 1665. Several of Ballin's drawings for the Versailles vases are in the Bibliothèque Nationale.
The 4th Marquess of Hertford (1800-1870), due to his friendshp with Napoleon III, was granted permission (c. 1857) to have bronze casts of the urns made for the Château de Bagatelle, his estate outside of Paris. It is known from the inventory of the contents of Bagatelle in 1871 that 46 vases after Ballin's designs existed in the collection. Moreover, other examples of the vases were cast for English collections, primarily for the friends of the Marquess and his son and heir, Sir Richard Wallace (1818-1890). Later in the 19th Century, the Versailles urns were copied in various mediums and in reduced sizes by foundries such as Durenne, Dugel, A. Beurdeley, Barbezat et Cie and Barbédienne.
The present lot, like the examples made for the Marquess of Hertford, bears no founder's mark. As it is comparable in size, technique and quality, it can be assumed to be comtemporary with the Wallace Collection example.
The offered lot is after on of thirteen different pairs of urns made for the marble parpets separating the Parterre du Nord from the Parterre du Midi at Versailles, where they are still in position. Claude Ballin (1615-1678), goldsmith to Louis XIV was commissioned to design the ensemble which were then modeled by Legendre, Magnière, Tuby and Anguier and cast bu Duval after 1665. Several of Ballin's drawings for the Versailles vases are in the Bibliothèque Nationale.
The 4th Marquess of Hertford (1800-1870), due to his friendshp with Napoleon III, was granted permission (c. 1857) to have bronze casts of the urns made for the Château de Bagatelle, his estate outside of Paris. It is known from the inventory of the contents of Bagatelle in 1871 that 46 vases after Ballin's designs existed in the collection. Moreover, other examples of the vases were cast for English collections, primarily for the friends of the Marquess and his son and heir, Sir Richard Wallace (1818-1890). Later in the 19th Century, the Versailles urns were copied in various mediums and in reduced sizes by foundries such as Durenne, Dugel, A. Beurdeley, Barbezat et Cie and Barbédienne.
The present lot, like the examples made for the Marquess of Hertford, bears no founder's mark. As it is comparable in size, technique and quality, it can be assumed to be comtemporary with the Wallace Collection example.