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Lot Essay
KENT HOUSE AND THE PROVENANCE
The chimneypiece formed part of the magnificent furnishings of Kent House, Knightsbridge, London, which was built in the early 1870s for Louisa, Lady Ashburton, widow of William Baring Bingham, 2nd Baron Ashburton. Lady Ashburton was a leading figure in society and one of the foremost patrons and collectors of her day. The house in Knightsbridge was the realisation of her tastes and aspirations, providing the setting for grand entertainments amid a celebrated collection of old master pictures and other works of art.
Although built in the 1870s, it is known that Kent House contained a number of earlier chimneypieces which Lady Ashburton had asked to be re-used. The reference to these chimneypieces occurs in a letter from the biographer John Forster to Lady Ashburton of 4 April 1873, preserved in the Baring collection and quoted (Greenacombe, op. cit., p. 220, n. 559.) and the present chimneypiece was almost certainly among this group differing markedly in style from others made for the house at the same time.
One possible source for this chimneypiece is the house that Lady Ashburton was replacing. The name Kent House had been given to a house on the same site that had been much enlarged in 1801 for Queen Victoria's father, Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn. He built and furnished extravagantly for himself and his mistress, Madame de St. Laurent. Descriptions of the interior mention marble chimneypieces (Greenacombe, op. cit., p. 135) and it seems possible that some of these could have been re-used in the 1870 house. When the Duke's house was pulled down in 1870, Lady Ashburton was the first tenant of the cleared site so was better placed than any subsequent builder to obtain earlier fittings.
This chimneypiece was fitted in the Library, a room on the first floor adjoining a larger neo-classical Music Room. A contrasting chimneypiece was designed and made in 1873 for the ground floor Dining-Room (ibid., pls. 66c and 118d). This large dark wooden chimneypiece was in 16th century Italian style, with an inset painting by Edward Lear, and could hardly differ more strikingly from the neo-classicism of the Library chimneypiece. The Music Room chimneypiece, also in a classical style, is illustrated ibid., pl. 67c and was also presumably re-used from elsewhere. The Dining-Room had originally been planned for the first floor, but was moved to the ground floor during building. This could explain why this 'bacchic' chimneypiece was installed in a room that became a library.
Kent House, described by Carlyle as 'very stately', was built in brick and Portland-stone in the Renaissance style. Apart from John Forster, the biographer of Dickens, Lady Ashburton's advisers included the American Rome-based sculptress Harriet Hosmer, with whom she had a close relationship, and the connoisseur Sir Coutts Lindsay. These advisers were given remarkably free rein to influence the architect Henry Clutton, who had built the Barings' country seat, Melchet Court in Hampshire.
THE CHIMNEYPIECE
This statuary marble chimneypiece, inlaid with Sicilian jasper, is designed in the 'antique' style with paired Egyptian palm-capped pillars wrapped by reeds in the manner of Roman fasces. Its bas relief medallion and tablets of Egyptian porphyry and rouge griotte reflect the antiquarian fashion promoted by G.B. Piranesi's Diverse Manieri of 1769, discussed in J. Scott, Piranesi, London, 1974, pp. 224-225. The projecting frieze tablet displays a sacred veil-draped medallion that is likely to be 18th century and which celebrates the Feast of Bacchus, the vintage and Autumn season. Cupid embraces a thyrsus-bearing youth, who treads grapes in a cistern, while his companions empty grapes from a basket and prepare to play pan-pipes. End tablets, which are likely to date from the early l9th century, are similarly framed by leaves, and these celebrate the chase with hounds in pursuit of a stag and boar.
Related bas reliefs are on a chimneypiece designed by G.B. Piranesi and commissioned from the Florentine workshops of Francis Harwood in the early 1770s for Wedderburn Castle, Berwickshire (A. Rowan, 'Wedderburn Castle', Country Life, 8 August 1974, p. 356, fig. 6). A chimneypiece with similar putti panels flanked by rectangular granite panels was at Londonderry House, Park Lane (Country Life, 10 July 1937, p. 42, fig. 11).
Perhaps the earliest comparable is a chimneypiece now at Gorhambury, Hertfordshire (Country Life, 25 November 1933, p. 559), that has rectangular panels of carved porphyry in the frieze. This, and another chimneypiece, were bought from Piranesi circa 1770 by Edward Walter (1727-80), father-in-law of the 1st Viscount Grimston, for Bury Hill, Dorking, and were subsequently moved to Gorhambury (A Dictionary of British and Irish Travellers in Italy 1701-1800, London, 1997, p. 997).
The chimneypiece formed part of the magnificent furnishings of Kent House, Knightsbridge, London, which was built in the early 1870s for Louisa, Lady Ashburton, widow of William Baring Bingham, 2nd Baron Ashburton. Lady Ashburton was a leading figure in society and one of the foremost patrons and collectors of her day. The house in Knightsbridge was the realisation of her tastes and aspirations, providing the setting for grand entertainments amid a celebrated collection of old master pictures and other works of art.
Although built in the 1870s, it is known that Kent House contained a number of earlier chimneypieces which Lady Ashburton had asked to be re-used. The reference to these chimneypieces occurs in a letter from the biographer John Forster to Lady Ashburton of 4 April 1873, preserved in the Baring collection and quoted (Greenacombe, op. cit., p. 220, n. 559.) and the present chimneypiece was almost certainly among this group differing markedly in style from others made for the house at the same time.
One possible source for this chimneypiece is the house that Lady Ashburton was replacing. The name Kent House had been given to a house on the same site that had been much enlarged in 1801 for Queen Victoria's father, Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn. He built and furnished extravagantly for himself and his mistress, Madame de St. Laurent. Descriptions of the interior mention marble chimneypieces (Greenacombe, op. cit., p. 135) and it seems possible that some of these could have been re-used in the 1870 house. When the Duke's house was pulled down in 1870, Lady Ashburton was the first tenant of the cleared site so was better placed than any subsequent builder to obtain earlier fittings.
This chimneypiece was fitted in the Library, a room on the first floor adjoining a larger neo-classical Music Room. A contrasting chimneypiece was designed and made in 1873 for the ground floor Dining-Room (ibid., pls. 66c and 118d). This large dark wooden chimneypiece was in 16th century Italian style, with an inset painting by Edward Lear, and could hardly differ more strikingly from the neo-classicism of the Library chimneypiece. The Music Room chimneypiece, also in a classical style, is illustrated ibid., pl. 67c and was also presumably re-used from elsewhere. The Dining-Room had originally been planned for the first floor, but was moved to the ground floor during building. This could explain why this 'bacchic' chimneypiece was installed in a room that became a library.
Kent House, described by Carlyle as 'very stately', was built in brick and Portland-stone in the Renaissance style. Apart from John Forster, the biographer of Dickens, Lady Ashburton's advisers included the American Rome-based sculptress Harriet Hosmer, with whom she had a close relationship, and the connoisseur Sir Coutts Lindsay. These advisers were given remarkably free rein to influence the architect Henry Clutton, who had built the Barings' country seat, Melchet Court in Hampshire.
THE CHIMNEYPIECE
This statuary marble chimneypiece, inlaid with Sicilian jasper, is designed in the 'antique' style with paired Egyptian palm-capped pillars wrapped by reeds in the manner of Roman fasces. Its bas relief medallion and tablets of Egyptian porphyry and rouge griotte reflect the antiquarian fashion promoted by G.B. Piranesi's Diverse Manieri of 1769, discussed in J. Scott, Piranesi, London, 1974, pp. 224-225. The projecting frieze tablet displays a sacred veil-draped medallion that is likely to be 18th century and which celebrates the Feast of Bacchus, the vintage and Autumn season. Cupid embraces a thyrsus-bearing youth, who treads grapes in a cistern, while his companions empty grapes from a basket and prepare to play pan-pipes. End tablets, which are likely to date from the early l9th century, are similarly framed by leaves, and these celebrate the chase with hounds in pursuit of a stag and boar.
Related bas reliefs are on a chimneypiece designed by G.B. Piranesi and commissioned from the Florentine workshops of Francis Harwood in the early 1770s for Wedderburn Castle, Berwickshire (A. Rowan, 'Wedderburn Castle', Country Life, 8 August 1974, p. 356, fig. 6). A chimneypiece with similar putti panels flanked by rectangular granite panels was at Londonderry House, Park Lane (Country Life, 10 July 1937, p. 42, fig. 11).
Perhaps the earliest comparable is a chimneypiece now at Gorhambury, Hertfordshire (Country Life, 25 November 1933, p. 559), that has rectangular panels of carved porphyry in the frieze. This, and another chimneypiece, were bought from Piranesi circa 1770 by Edward Walter (1727-80), father-in-law of the 1st Viscount Grimston, for Bury Hill, Dorking, and were subsequently moved to Gorhambury (A Dictionary of British and Irish Travellers in Italy 1701-1800, London, 1997, p. 997).