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Lot Essay
The sphinx was one of the most consistently used symbols of royal splendour and power and, in particular, they were deployed as garden sculpture in the formal and programmatic royal gardens of France in the 17th and 18th centuries. Often used to demarcate an allée or entranceway, it was perhaps their mythological reputation as gatekeepers that lent them particular significance in the schemes of contemporary garden designs. Large carved marble figures of sphinxes including those surmounted by bronze putti by the sculptors Lerambert and Houzeau, after Jacques Sarazin, of 1667-68, still remain at Versailles at the entrance to the Parterre du Midi (illustrated in Pincas, loc. cit.). A set of gilded lead sphinxes was supplied for the terraces of the Royal Pavilion of Marly by Jean Hardy in 1703. Now destroyed, these sphinxes are known today from drawings by Hardy and they show a number of similarities to the present sphinxes including their upright posture, the diadem and ringleted hair, and the decorative blanket across each back.
This was a trend that continued throughout the 18th century at the Royal residences, as can be seen in the group of eight stone sphinxes representing the Four Seasons of circa 1777-78 which decorated the Belvedere of Marie-Antoinette at the Trianon of Versailles, by Joseph Deschamps (d. 1788). A magnificent pair of these stone sphinxes, those representing Autumn, were sold Christie's, London, 9 December 2004, lot 240 (£386,000).
STANFORD WHITE AND HENRY W. POOR
Stanford White's connection to Henry Poor is well-documented, as White built and furnished Poor's large private house on Gramercy Park in New York (see Craven, loc. cit.). This robber baron palace lasted just nine years and the site is now occupied by the cooperative apartment building known by its iconic address: '1 Lexington Avenue'. And while Poor's estate at Tuxedo was built by Henry Randall, Stanford White certainly could have continued to provide furniture and objects to the immense house. The most dramatic aspect of the estate is the great series of terraced formal gardens, which would have been an ideal setting for the present lot. The name of the house was quickly proven all too apt as Poor's fortune vanished in the Panic of 1907 and the contents of the house were dispersed. However, the house and its empty gardens, in all their 'Jacobethan' glory, still tower above Tuxedo Park to this day.
The sphinx was one of the most consistently used symbols of royal splendour and power and, in particular, they were deployed as garden sculpture in the formal and programmatic royal gardens of France in the 17th and 18th centuries. Often used to demarcate an allée or entranceway, it was perhaps their mythological reputation as gatekeepers that lent them particular significance in the schemes of contemporary garden designs. Large carved marble figures of sphinxes including those surmounted by bronze putti by the sculptors Lerambert and Houzeau, after Jacques Sarazin, of 1667-68, still remain at Versailles at the entrance to the Parterre du Midi (illustrated in Pincas, loc. cit.). A set of gilded lead sphinxes was supplied for the terraces of the Royal Pavilion of Marly by Jean Hardy in 1703. Now destroyed, these sphinxes are known today from drawings by Hardy and they show a number of similarities to the present sphinxes including their upright posture, the diadem and ringleted hair, and the decorative blanket across each back.
This was a trend that continued throughout the 18th century at the Royal residences, as can be seen in the group of eight stone sphinxes representing the Four Seasons of circa 1777-78 which decorated the Belvedere of Marie-Antoinette at the Trianon of Versailles, by Joseph Deschamps (d. 1788). A magnificent pair of these stone sphinxes, those representing Autumn, were sold Christie's, London, 9 December 2004, lot 240 (£386,000).
STANFORD WHITE AND HENRY W. POOR
Stanford White's connection to Henry Poor is well-documented, as White built and furnished Poor's large private house on Gramercy Park in New York (see Craven, loc. cit.). This robber baron palace lasted just nine years and the site is now occupied by the cooperative apartment building known by its iconic address: '1 Lexington Avenue'. And while Poor's estate at Tuxedo was built by Henry Randall, Stanford White certainly could have continued to provide furniture and objects to the immense house. The most dramatic aspect of the estate is the great series of terraced formal gardens, which would have been an ideal setting for the present lot. The name of the house was quickly proven all too apt as Poor's fortune vanished in the Panic of 1907 and the contents of the house were dispersed. However, the house and its empty gardens, in all their 'Jacobethan' glory, still tower above Tuxedo Park to this day.