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Lot Essay
This exceptional and rare charger is from the service commissioned by Count Petr Petrovich Konovnitsyn (1764-1822) on the occasion of his marriage to Anna Ivanovna Korsakova (1769-1843) in 1798, the same year as the confirmation of his coat-of-arms depicted on the charger. Consisting of approximately seventy pieces, the large service included four round chargers. The present lot appears to be one of them. Another known example of these four chargers is on view at the Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens (inv. no. 13.14).
Count Petr Konovnitsyn came from a noble Russian family and played an important role during the Napoleonic Wars. He was appointed Minister of War in 1815 and General of the Infantry in 1817. Parts of the Konovnitsyn service were in the collection of Princess M.A. Shakhovskaya prior to the Revolution (see Starye gody, June, 1914, pp. 6-7). A soup tureen from the Konovnitsyn service is preserved in the State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg (Z.Z. Bernyakovich, Russian Silver Wares of the XVIIth - Beginning of the XXth Century in the State Hermitage Collection, Leningrad, 1977, p. 96).
The Konovnitsyn service was commissioned in 1798 from Semen Kuzov, a prominent Moscow niello master. A year later he was also commissioned to make a similar service for Count Nikolai Petrovich Sheremetev (1751-1809), who was an influential patron of the arts. Extant pieces from these exceptionally detailed services are very rare and constitute some of the finest niello work ever produced.
For a nearly identical dish from the collection of the Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens, Washington D.C., see A. Odom, Russian Silver in America: Surviving the Melting Pot, London, 2011, p. 110, no. 82; also see A. Odom and L.P. Arend, Exhibition catalogue, A Taste for Splendor, Russian Imperial and European Treasures from the Hillwood Museum, Alexandria, Virginia, 1998, p. 151, no. 61.
Comparable nielloed soup tureens from the Sheremetev service were sold Christie's, New York, 24 April 2009, lot 66, and Christie's, London, 28 November 2011, lot 316.
Count Petr Konovnitsyn came from a noble Russian family and played an important role during the Napoleonic Wars. He was appointed Minister of War in 1815 and General of the Infantry in 1817. Parts of the Konovnitsyn service were in the collection of Princess M.A. Shakhovskaya prior to the Revolution (see Starye gody, June, 1914, pp. 6-7). A soup tureen from the Konovnitsyn service is preserved in the State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg (Z.Z. Bernyakovich, Russian Silver Wares of the XVIIth - Beginning of the XXth Century in the State Hermitage Collection, Leningrad, 1977, p. 96).
The Konovnitsyn service was commissioned in 1798 from Semen Kuzov, a prominent Moscow niello master. A year later he was also commissioned to make a similar service for Count Nikolai Petrovich Sheremetev (1751-1809), who was an influential patron of the arts. Extant pieces from these exceptionally detailed services are very rare and constitute some of the finest niello work ever produced.
For a nearly identical dish from the collection of the Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens, Washington D.C., see A. Odom, Russian Silver in America: Surviving the Melting Pot, London, 2011, p. 110, no. 82; also see A. Odom and L.P. Arend, Exhibition catalogue, A Taste for Splendor, Russian Imperial and European Treasures from the Hillwood Museum, Alexandria, Virginia, 1998, p. 151, no. 61.
Comparable nielloed soup tureens from the Sheremetev service were sold Christie's, New York, 24 April 2009, lot 66, and Christie's, London, 28 November 2011, lot 316.