LAST QUARTER 19TH CENTURY

Having only been re-discovered in Oran, Algeria in 1849, onyx-mounted furniture and decorations first emerged in the public sphere to great acclaim at the 1862 London Exhibition. Reminiscent of works supplied by Eugène Cornu through G. Viot and the Compagnie des Marbres Onyx d'Algérie, these sumptuous vases are exemplary of changing mid-century tastes which were undoubtedly fuelled by exotic wares displayed in the Indian, Chinese, Turkish, and Egyptian pavilions of the International Exhibitions. Cornu and other artists who specialised in objects and furniture incorporating onyx, marble and enamel elements also supplied hardstones to their contemporaries, including celebrated Orientalist sculptor Charles-Henri-Joseph Cordier, who was fêted for his polychromatic images of North African and Islamic subjects.