.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Pierre Garnier, maître in 1742.
The son of François Garnier, a Parisian maître ébéniste, Pierre Garnier established himself in the rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs at the beginning of his long career. Often at the forefront of inovative new styles from the rococo through to neo-classicism, he quickly established himself, winning many influential and wealthy patrons. These included the duchesse du Mazarin whose appartements were considered the epitomy of current taste, Germaine Baron, General Collector of Taxes and most importantly the marquis de Marigny, brother of Madame de Pompadour, who was also director general of buildings, gardens, the arts, schools and workshops to the King, for his palatial home in the Place des Victoires in 1778. In addition to these individual commissions it is without doubt that Garnier worked for the marchand-merciers and much of the lacquered furniture produced by him and his confrère Léonard Boudin may well have been supplied to these marchands.
This commode à l'anglaise is derived from a form popularised by Garnier in the Transitional style, as demonstrated by the pair in the Salon des Huet in the Nissim de Camondo Museum (illustrated in P. Verlet, French Cabinetmakers of the Eighteenth Century, New York, 1965, p.197). The open sides designed to display objets d'art, have a certain fluidity rather than the more regimented straight lines of the early goût grec period. Characteristic at this later date of Garnier's oeuvre are the deeply fluted uprights and the spiralled toupie feet. A commode displaying very similar features is illustrated in P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Français du XVIIIeme Siècle, Paris, 1989, p.340, fig.B. Whilst the features on this commode and the exceptional quality of his work make Garnier one of the most respected ébénistes of his time and he is considered to be one of the most influential forces in the evolution of the goût grec. Further evidence of this and with strikingly similar foliate volutes and stopped-flutes to the angles as well as his signature toupie feet feature on a lacquer secrétaire formerly in The Collection of M. Francis Guérault, sold M. Alphonse Bellier, 16 May 1935, lot 55.
The son of François Garnier, a Parisian maître ébéniste, Pierre Garnier established himself in the rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs at the beginning of his long career. Often at the forefront of inovative new styles from the rococo through to neo-classicism, he quickly established himself, winning many influential and wealthy patrons. These included the duchesse du Mazarin whose appartements were considered the epitomy of current taste, Germaine Baron, General Collector of Taxes and most importantly the marquis de Marigny, brother of Madame de Pompadour, who was also director general of buildings, gardens, the arts, schools and workshops to the King, for his palatial home in the Place des Victoires in 1778. In addition to these individual commissions it is without doubt that Garnier worked for the marchand-merciers and much of the lacquered furniture produced by him and his confrère Léonard Boudin may well have been supplied to these marchands.
This commode à l'anglaise is derived from a form popularised by Garnier in the Transitional style, as demonstrated by the pair in the Salon des Huet in the Nissim de Camondo Museum (illustrated in P. Verlet, French Cabinetmakers of the Eighteenth Century, New York, 1965, p.197). The open sides designed to display objets d'art, have a certain fluidity rather than the more regimented straight lines of the early goût grec period. Characteristic at this later date of Garnier's oeuvre are the deeply fluted uprights and the spiralled toupie feet. A commode displaying very similar features is illustrated in P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Français du XVIIIeme Siècle, Paris, 1989, p.340, fig.B. Whilst the features on this commode and the exceptional quality of his work make Garnier one of the most respected ébénistes of his time and he is considered to be one of the most influential forces in the evolution of the goût grec. Further evidence of this and with strikingly similar foliate volutes and stopped-flutes to the angles as well as his signature toupie feet feature on a lacquer secrétaire formerly in The Collection of M. Francis Guérault, sold M. Alphonse Bellier, 16 May 1935, lot 55.