THE PROPERTY OF THE SAINT LOUIS ART MUSEUM, SOLD TO BENEFIT THE ACQUISITION FUND (LOTS 9-14)

A GEORGE II MAHOGANY OCTAGONAL TRIPOD TABLE

CIRCA 1750

Details

A GEORGE II MAHOGANY OCTAGONAL TRIPOD TABLE
CIRCA 1750
THE TILT-TOP WITH PIERCED WAVY GALLERY, ON A FLUTED AND ACANTHUS-CLASPED BALUSTER COLUMN, ON CABRIOLE LEGS HEADED BY ACANTHUS AND CLAW FEET, WITH PRINTED PAPER LABEL 'BRITISH ANTIQUE DEALERS' ASSOCIATION ART TREASURES EXHIBITION CHRISTIES 1932 / No. 173', with painted inventory number '826:40', the banjo catch reattached
27 in. (69 cm.) high, 27 in. (68.5 cm.) octagonal

Provenance

with Stair & Andrew, New York, 1932.
Purchased from Mallett & Son, London, 1940.

Exhibited

London, Christie's, BADA Art Treasures Exhibition, 1932, cat. no. 173 (exhibitor: Stair & Andrew).

Further details

*This lot may be tax exempt from sales tax, as set forth in the Sales Tax Notice at the back of the catalogue

Lot Essay

The china-railed tea-table is designed in the George II Roman fashion with octagonal compartmented tray on antique-fluted pillar and tripod claw. The everted rail is waved in picturesque fashion and fretted with foliate 'rainceau' issuing from central cartouches of confronted wave-scrolls. Its pillar rises from a reeded 'vase' baluster which is wreathed by Roman acanthus; while its plinth displays Cupid's darts enwreathed in an echinous molding. Its truss-scrolled 'claw' is bound in acanthus tied by voluted ribbons and terminates in eagle-claws. The latter evoke the poets' history of Jupiter's eagle in bearing aloft the shepherd Gannymede for service as cup-bearer at banquets. Such tripod pillars were popular in the 1730s and featured, for instance, on the contemporary trade-sheet issued by the Holborn cabinet-maker Thomas Potter (d. 1782)(C. Gilbert and T. Murdoch, John Channon and brass-inlaid furniture 1730-1760, London, 1993, p. 19, fig. 11).

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