CIRCA 1720-30

This dazzling bureau reflects the enduring fascination in the West for the luxury products of the East, in particular the lacquer and porcelain wares of China and Japan, whose perfected techniques in these materials remained so mysterious and alluring to Western craftsmen. It is decorated in the rarest colour employed by vernisseurs in the 18th Century, a rich azure blue which may well have used the precious hardstone lapis lazuli in its preparation. Blue was never used as a ground colour in the 17th or 18th Century in Japanese or Chinese lacquers, and its use here demonstrates how, by the 1730s and 1740s, the vernisseurs (or lacquer craftsmen) of Paris were not just slavishly imitating Asian lacquers, but creating their own visual vocabulary.

The rarity of the use of blue is indicated by the fact that only a handful of pieces decorated in blue vernis martin are recorded in inventories in the 18th Century, all supplied to elite aristocratic patrons. The most celebrated is the commode and encoignure by Mathieu Criaerd, supplied by Thomas-Joachim Hébert in 1742 to Louis XV’s mistress Madame de Mailly for her Salon Bleu at the château de Choisy, now in the Louvre. However the decoration of these pieces, although inspired by chinoiseries, is much more Western and pictorial in style with rococo frames and only loosely imitates Chinese or Japanese lacquers, and is actually closer in spirit to the blue and white porcelain which was an important feature of the room.

The duchesse d’Orléans owned a bureau at the château de Saint Cloud by 1759, described as ‘un secrétaire verny de Martin fond bleu dur, ornements de bronze doré d’or moulu 160 livres.’ A second example was in the collection of the celebrated collector, Jean-Baptiste de Machault d'Arnouville, contrôleur général des finances to Louis XV, recorded in the château d’Arnouville after his death and described as ‘un petit secrétaire de fond bleu 48 livres’.

Only four blue-ground bureaux en pente decorated in imitation of Japanese lacquer are recorded today:
- The current unstamped example.
- An example by Migeon with vernis martin decoration attributed to the Martin Freres, sold Christie's London, 9 July 2015, lot 21 (illustrated in A. Forray-Carlier and M. Kopplin et al., Les Secrets de la Laque Français, exh. cat., Paris, 2014, p. 91, cat. 46).
- A second example by Migeon, with gilt decoration simulating ormolu chutes to the top of the legs, previously in the collection of René Weiller, sold Christie's, London, 17 April 1980, lot 188, and which later reappeared on the Paris art market, having had its varnish removed, which had discoloured giving it a green appearance (S. Mouquin, Pierre IV Migeon, Paris, 2001 p. 95., fig. 39).
- An example by BVRB, with a pale blue ground, formerly with Steinitz, Paris and now in a private collection (illustrated in T. Wolvesperges, Le Meuble Français en Laque au XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1999, p. 117, fig. 69).
- An unstamped example supplied circa 1750-1751 to Madame de Pompadour for the château de Bellevue, stamped with the ‘C’ couronné poinçon, a tax mark employed on any alloy containing copper between March 1745 and February 1749, now in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris. As this does not appear in the bills of Lazare Duvaux’s deliveries to Bellevue, it is possible it was ordered from another marchand-mercier such as Thomas-Joachim Hébert. Although unstamped, the distinctive pattern of contrasting light and dark amaranth and plum woods of the interior makes it likely that it was executed by Adrien-Faizelot Delorme, who specialized in this use of woods (B. Rondot, Madame de Pompadour et les Arts, exh. cat., Paris, 2002, pp. 326-7).

The fact that four of the five extant examples of bureaux employing a blue ground are by different makers or unstamped points to the likelihood that they were commissioned by a marchand-mercier such as Hébert, who particularly specialised in lacquer (and who was an important supplier to Machault d’Arnouville).

THE MARTIN BROTHERS AND THE ART OF LACQUER WORK
The Martin brothers, who perfected a technique for imitating Chinese and Japanese lacquer, are one of the select few elite craftsmen, along with Boulle, Cressent and Gouthière, to be named in catalogues and inventories in the 18th Century, such was the fame of their artistry. The most important workshops were operated by the eldest of the brothers, Guillaume (1689-1749), who was made vernisseur du Roi in 1713 and in 1730 was granted the right ‘…de fabriquer, faire, vendre et débiter toutes sortes d’ouvrages en relief de sa composition, dans le goût du Japon ou de la Chine…’, and Etienne-Simon (1703-1770), vernisseur du Roi in 1728. While Guillaume particularly specialized in smaller objects, Etienne-Simon expanded the business to include complete lacquer décors for rooms, and one can imagine this rare bureau might have been commissioned to harmonise with a special lacquer scheme for a client. On his death in 1770 Etienne-Simon was owed the enormous sum of 270,000 livres, indicating how extensive the business had become. Interestingly, there is very little mention in the accounts of the Martin frères of any transactions directly with ébénistes, implying that the bulk of their commissions to decorate furniture would have come through marchands-merciers.