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Lot Essay
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE
Y. Christ, Le Faubourg Saint Germain, 1996, pp.300-303.
C. Baulez, Le Faubourg Saint Germain-La rue de Varenne, 1981, pp. 64-74.
B. Pons, French Period Rooms 1650-1800, 1995, pp. 324-333.
This elegant Gout Grec console was possibly commissioned by Pierre-Gaspard-Marie-Grimod d'Orsay, comte d'Orsay, circa 1768, as it is ensuite in design to a pair of consoles à encoignures in ebony ordered by the Comte d'Orsay for the bedroom of his hôtel, 69 rue de Varenne, Paris, circa 1768 and sold from a Private Collection, Christie's New York, 21 May 1996, lot 333.
THE COMTE D'ORSAY CONSOLES A ENCOIGNURES
The consoles à encoignures ordered by the comte d'Orsay were probably provided by one of the count's regular suppliers such as the marchands-merciers Thomas Joachim Hébert (d. 1773) and Charles-Raymond Granchez (active 1760's-1780's). The encoignures are documented first in an inventory compiled after the death of the comte d'Orsay's first wife, the princess Marie-Louise-Albertine-Amélie de Croÿ Molembais. On the 28th of February, 1774 they were listed in the first floor bedroom:
deux autres (consoles) en encoignure de bois d'ébéne avec leurs bronzes de cuivre doré et leur dessus de marbre blanc veiné
THE COMTE D'ORSAY AND HIS HÔTEL IN RUE DE VARENNE
D'Orsay was the son of a wealthy fermier général and intendant des postes, Pierre Grimod Duford. The young Grimod d'Orsay's two worldly ambitions were to live in a sumptuous environment surrounded by exquisite works of art and to marry into the aristocracy. In 1770 he married the princesse de Croÿ -Molembais by whom he had one son, the future general d'Orsay. Widowed at an early age of 24, he soon married again to Marien-Anne Elisabeth de Hohenbole Woldenburg and left France permanently to live on his father-in-law's estate in 1787. As he was considered an emigré at the time of the Revolution, his possessions were confiscated and many pieces later found their way into the collections of various French museums
The hôtel d'Orsay, formerly the hôtel de Clermont, at 69 rue de Varenne was build in the 18th century for marquise de Saissac. Her descendants lived sold the hôtel in 1768 to the young comte who moved in with his mother. The ground floor was decorated in the latest neoclassical fashion by Jean-François-Thèrése Chalgrin (1734-1811), the young architect who in 1774 would work for the comte de Provence. The boiseries for the salon are now in the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
Though inspired by a console design conceived by André-Charles Boulle and published by Mariette in his Nouveaux deisseins de meubles et ouvrages de bronze et de marqueterie inventés et gravés par André-Charles Boulle et sa famille; nouvelles recherches, nouveaux documents, 1979, p.218), this console with its simplified form and Virtruvian scroll mounts clearly reflects the taste for neoclassicism that was overshadowing rococo by the 1760's.
Y. Christ, Le Faubourg Saint Germain, 1996, pp.300-303.
C. Baulez, Le Faubourg Saint Germain-La rue de Varenne, 1981, pp. 64-74.
B. Pons, French Period Rooms 1650-1800, 1995, pp. 324-333.
This elegant Gout Grec console was possibly commissioned by Pierre-Gaspard-Marie-Grimod d'Orsay, comte d'Orsay, circa 1768, as it is ensuite in design to a pair of consoles à encoignures in ebony ordered by the Comte d'Orsay for the bedroom of his hôtel, 69 rue de Varenne, Paris, circa 1768 and sold from a Private Collection, Christie's New York, 21 May 1996, lot 333.
THE COMTE D'ORSAY CONSOLES A ENCOIGNURES
The consoles à encoignures ordered by the comte d'Orsay were probably provided by one of the count's regular suppliers such as the marchands-merciers Thomas Joachim Hébert (d. 1773) and Charles-Raymond Granchez (active 1760's-1780's). The encoignures are documented first in an inventory compiled after the death of the comte d'Orsay's first wife, the princess Marie-Louise-Albertine-Amélie de Croÿ Molembais. On the 28th of February, 1774 they were listed in the first floor bedroom:
deux autres (consoles) en encoignure de bois d'ébéne avec leurs bronzes de cuivre doré et leur dessus de marbre blanc veiné
THE COMTE D'ORSAY AND HIS HÔTEL IN RUE DE VARENNE
D'Orsay was the son of a wealthy fermier général and intendant des postes, Pierre Grimod Duford. The young Grimod d'Orsay's two worldly ambitions were to live in a sumptuous environment surrounded by exquisite works of art and to marry into the aristocracy. In 1770 he married the princesse de Croÿ -Molembais by whom he had one son, the future general d'Orsay. Widowed at an early age of 24, he soon married again to Marien-Anne Elisabeth de Hohenbole Woldenburg and left France permanently to live on his father-in-law's estate in 1787. As he was considered an emigré at the time of the Revolution, his possessions were confiscated and many pieces later found their way into the collections of various French museums
The hôtel d'Orsay, formerly the hôtel de Clermont, at 69 rue de Varenne was build in the 18th century for marquise de Saissac. Her descendants lived sold the hôtel in 1768 to the young comte who moved in with his mother. The ground floor was decorated in the latest neoclassical fashion by Jean-François-Thèrése Chalgrin (1734-1811), the young architect who in 1774 would work for the comte de Provence. The boiseries for the salon are now in the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
Though inspired by a console design conceived by André-Charles Boulle and published by Mariette in his Nouveaux deisseins de meubles et ouvrages de bronze et de marqueterie inventés et gravés par André-Charles Boulle et sa famille; nouvelles recherches, nouveaux documents, 1979, p.218), this console with its simplified form and Virtruvian scroll mounts clearly reflects the taste for neoclassicism that was overshadowing rococo by the 1760's.