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Lot Essay
Mathieu Bauve, maître in 1754.
This remarkable suite of goût grec seat-furniture is amongst the chefs d'oeuvres of Mathieu Bauve. Whilst Bauve's Louis XV production is not exceptional in form, his style changed dramatically in the 1760's when he went on to produce a few late Louis XV masterpieces. This includes the suite of bergères reputedly made for Queen Marie-Antoinette's theatre at Versailles, an order shared with his fellow menuisier Jean-Baptiste Boulard (a Boulard example if illustrated in P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Frangais du XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1998, p. 105. Another example of his remarquable skill in executing late Louis XV designs is the fauteuil sold Ader Picard Tajan, Paris, 14 June 1983, lot 145 (illustrated Kjellberg, op. cit., p.49).
The distinctive scrolled and voluted bracket legs also feature on the pair of bergeres by Bauve at Versailles, which were given by the Duchess of Windsor in 1973 and are now in the apartments of Madame du Barry. They are illustrated and discussed in P. Arizzoli-Clémentel, Versailles Furniture of the Royal Palace, Dijon, 2002, Vol. II, no.81, pp.230-231.
With its highly fashionable goût grec-inspired design, the Champalimaud suite relates to designs by the architect Jean-Louis Prieur and more precisely to his designs drawn in the mid 1760s for the Royal Palace at Warsaw, illustrated in S. Eriksen, Early Neo-classicism in France, London 1974, fig. 413-414.
This remarkable suite of goût grec seat-furniture is amongst the chefs d'oeuvres of Mathieu Bauve. Whilst Bauve's Louis XV production is not exceptional in form, his style changed dramatically in the 1760's when he went on to produce a few late Louis XV masterpieces. This includes the suite of bergères reputedly made for Queen Marie-Antoinette's theatre at Versailles, an order shared with his fellow menuisier Jean-Baptiste Boulard (a Boulard example if illustrated in P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Frangais du XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1998, p. 105. Another example of his remarquable skill in executing late Louis XV designs is the fauteuil sold Ader Picard Tajan, Paris, 14 June 1983, lot 145 (illustrated Kjellberg, op. cit., p.49).
The distinctive scrolled and voluted bracket legs also feature on the pair of bergeres by Bauve at Versailles, which were given by the Duchess of Windsor in 1973 and are now in the apartments of Madame du Barry. They are illustrated and discussed in P. Arizzoli-Clémentel, Versailles Furniture of the Royal Palace, Dijon, 2002, Vol. II, no.81, pp.230-231.
With its highly fashionable goût grec-inspired design, the Champalimaud suite relates to designs by the architect Jean-Louis Prieur and more precisely to his designs drawn in the mid 1760s for the Royal Palace at Warsaw, illustrated in S. Eriksen, Early Neo-classicism in France, London 1974, fig. 413-414.