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拍品专文
Decorated with enchanting scenes in the chinoiserie taste in Roentgen's trademark marquetry à la mosaïque, this splendid Rollschreibtisch, or roll-top desk is a superb example of Roentgen's work during the remarkable ascent of his career. The elegant form, probably inspired by Louis XV models by François de Cuvilliés, serves as the perfect vehicle for the display of the fine marquetry for which Roentgen was rightly celebrated across Europe.
One of the chief glories of Roentgen's furniture of the 1760s and 1770s is his unique marquetry à la mosaïque, whereby no pieces of wood were scorched in hot sand to achieve the effect of shading, and no engraving was employed, but the full design was executed as a mosaic of small pieces of wood, like an intricate jigsaw puzzle. Roentgen developed this new technique in the late 1760s, and he first mentions it in describing a bureau that was offered as the first prize in a lottery of the firm's furniture organized in Hamburg in 1768:
... auf das künstlichste, mit Chinuesischen Figuren, a la Mosaique eingelegt ... Das allerwunderbar- und seltsamste hiebey aber ist, dass alle Figuren von lauter Hölzern gemacht, und zwar von solchen zusammengesucht- und choisierten Hölzern, dass dieselben eine vollkommene Mahlerey präsentieren […] (H. Huth, Roentgen Furniture, Abraham and David Roentgen: European Cabinet-Makers, London and New York, 1974, fig. 3a).
Interestingly, this experimental piece was already decorated with chinoiserie scenes and a slightly later bureau of circa 1771-1772, an early form of roll-top desk made for the Margrave of Baden, demonstrates that by that time Roentgen had elaborated a highly sophisticated repertory of chinoiserie scenes that he was to employ over and over again (G. Himmelheber, 'Roentgen-Möbel für Baden', Ausgewählte Werke aus den Sammlungen der Markgrafen und Grossherzöge von Baden, Patrimonia/Kulturstiftung der Länder 116, Karlsruhe 1996, pp. 95-113, figs. 1-8). These motifs mainly appear to derive from engravings by the French artist Jean Pillement (1728-1803), and the Augsburg engraver Martin Engelbrecht (1684-1756).
Roentgen’s marquetry was jigsaw-like not only in technique but also in composition, as he assembled larger scenes from reusable figures and individual elements. The figure holding a parrot under a palm tree can be found on the cupboard door of one of his fall-front secretaries; the gentleman under a parasol and his servant on an oval table: the bird-seller can be seen on the upper door of a cabinet (W. Koeppe, et. al., Extravagant Inventions: The Princely Furniture of the Roentgens, New Haven and London, 2012, p. 26, fig. 23; p. 37, fig. 36; and p. 111, respectively). Roentgen used a very similar overall scene on a more Neoclassical roll-top desk, now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (acc. no. 41.82). The figures depicted on the abovementioned works and our desk were designed by Januarius Zick (1730-1797) after an engraving by Engelbrecht, now in the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg (ibid., p. 106, fig. 64. This specific scene is one of the earliest documented chinoiserie compositions used by Roentgen and it can also be found on a longcase clock delivered for the Landgraves von Hessen circa 1770 (I. Reepen and E. Handke, Chinoiserie: Möbel und Wandverkleidungen, Bad Homburg, 1996, pp. 54-56). The delicate and lifelike floral marquetry decorating the sides and front of this desk is also a hallmark of the Roentgen atelier, originating in French prints after seventeenth-century still lives by artists such as Jean-Baptiste Monnoyer.
The splendid exhibition dedicated to the Roentgens presented at the Metropolitan Museum in New York in 2012 featured a wide range of cylinder desks from Neuwied. In fact, nine of the sixty-nine main works exhibited were bureaux of this type. Boasting provenances from across Europe, including the Dukes of Devonshire and the Landgraves and Grand Dukes of Hessen-Kassel, to Louis XVI and Catherine the Great, they are evidence of the high regard with which Roentgen's Rollschreibtische were seen and their great importance in his oeuvre. This desk is a rare product of the transitional period undergone by the Roentgen atelier during the late 1760s and early 1770s: with its cabriole legs and inclusion of mother-of-pearl highlights, it represents the stylistic transition from Rococo to Neoclassicism. Furthermore, it also constitutes an important move towards his more complex mechanical furniture. Here, the deep compartments are not yet spring-loaded and the writing slide is not operational independently from the roll-top, features commonly found in later bureaux produced by Roentgen. Similar ‘transitional’ roll-top desks with chinoiserie marquetry à la mosaïque and cabriole legs were delivered to the Elector of Bavaria and to the Elector of Saxony, among others (D. Fabian, Abraham und David Roentgen: Das noch aufgefundene Gesamtwerk ihrer Möbel- und Uhrenkunst in Verbindung mit der Uhrmacherfamilie Kinzing in Neuwied, Bad Neustadt an der Saale, 1996, pp. 101-103, nos. 217- 221). Other related richly-mounted 'transitional' Zylinderschreibtische by Roentgen include one formerly in the collection of Nathaniel de Rothschild, sold Sotheby's, New York, 3 December 1997, lot 104; another example in the Residenz, Munich (G. Hojer and H. Ottomeyer, Die Möbel der Residenz München: Die deutschen Möbel des 16. bis 18. Jahrhunderts, Munich, 1996, pp. 233-239); and one in the de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco (acc. no. 55.41.12). A cylinder desk with floral marquetry and of pure Neoclassical form with straight legs, formerly in the Doucet and Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections, was sold Sotheby's, London, 24 June 1988, lot 33.
One of the chief glories of Roentgen's furniture of the 1760s and 1770s is his unique marquetry à la mosaïque, whereby no pieces of wood were scorched in hot sand to achieve the effect of shading, and no engraving was employed, but the full design was executed as a mosaic of small pieces of wood, like an intricate jigsaw puzzle. Roentgen developed this new technique in the late 1760s, and he first mentions it in describing a bureau that was offered as the first prize in a lottery of the firm's furniture organized in Hamburg in 1768:
... auf das künstlichste, mit Chinuesischen Figuren, a la Mosaique eingelegt ... Das allerwunderbar- und seltsamste hiebey aber ist, dass alle Figuren von lauter Hölzern gemacht, und zwar von solchen zusammengesucht- und choisierten Hölzern, dass dieselben eine vollkommene Mahlerey präsentieren […] (H. Huth, Roentgen Furniture, Abraham and David Roentgen: European Cabinet-Makers, London and New York, 1974, fig. 3a).
Interestingly, this experimental piece was already decorated with chinoiserie scenes and a slightly later bureau of circa 1771-1772, an early form of roll-top desk made for the Margrave of Baden, demonstrates that by that time Roentgen had elaborated a highly sophisticated repertory of chinoiserie scenes that he was to employ over and over again (G. Himmelheber, 'Roentgen-Möbel für Baden', Ausgewählte Werke aus den Sammlungen der Markgrafen und Grossherzöge von Baden, Patrimonia/Kulturstiftung der Länder 116, Karlsruhe 1996, pp. 95-113, figs. 1-8). These motifs mainly appear to derive from engravings by the French artist Jean Pillement (1728-1803), and the Augsburg engraver Martin Engelbrecht (1684-1756).
Roentgen’s marquetry was jigsaw-like not only in technique but also in composition, as he assembled larger scenes from reusable figures and individual elements. The figure holding a parrot under a palm tree can be found on the cupboard door of one of his fall-front secretaries; the gentleman under a parasol and his servant on an oval table: the bird-seller can be seen on the upper door of a cabinet (W. Koeppe, et. al., Extravagant Inventions: The Princely Furniture of the Roentgens, New Haven and London, 2012, p. 26, fig. 23; p. 37, fig. 36; and p. 111, respectively). Roentgen used a very similar overall scene on a more Neoclassical roll-top desk, now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (acc. no. 41.82). The figures depicted on the abovementioned works and our desk were designed by Januarius Zick (1730-1797) after an engraving by Engelbrecht, now in the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg (ibid., p. 106, fig. 64. This specific scene is one of the earliest documented chinoiserie compositions used by Roentgen and it can also be found on a longcase clock delivered for the Landgraves von Hessen circa 1770 (I. Reepen and E. Handke, Chinoiserie: Möbel und Wandverkleidungen, Bad Homburg, 1996, pp. 54-56). The delicate and lifelike floral marquetry decorating the sides and front of this desk is also a hallmark of the Roentgen atelier, originating in French prints after seventeenth-century still lives by artists such as Jean-Baptiste Monnoyer.
The splendid exhibition dedicated to the Roentgens presented at the Metropolitan Museum in New York in 2012 featured a wide range of cylinder desks from Neuwied. In fact, nine of the sixty-nine main works exhibited were bureaux of this type. Boasting provenances from across Europe, including the Dukes of Devonshire and the Landgraves and Grand Dukes of Hessen-Kassel, to Louis XVI and Catherine the Great, they are evidence of the high regard with which Roentgen's Rollschreibtische were seen and their great importance in his oeuvre. This desk is a rare product of the transitional period undergone by the Roentgen atelier during the late 1760s and early 1770s: with its cabriole legs and inclusion of mother-of-pearl highlights, it represents the stylistic transition from Rococo to Neoclassicism. Furthermore, it also constitutes an important move towards his more complex mechanical furniture. Here, the deep compartments are not yet spring-loaded and the writing slide is not operational independently from the roll-top, features commonly found in later bureaux produced by Roentgen. Similar ‘transitional’ roll-top desks with chinoiserie marquetry à la mosaïque and cabriole legs were delivered to the Elector of Bavaria and to the Elector of Saxony, among others (D. Fabian, Abraham und David Roentgen: Das noch aufgefundene Gesamtwerk ihrer Möbel- und Uhrenkunst in Verbindung mit der Uhrmacherfamilie Kinzing in Neuwied, Bad Neustadt an der Saale, 1996, pp. 101-103, nos. 217- 221). Other related richly-mounted 'transitional' Zylinderschreibtische by Roentgen include one formerly in the collection of Nathaniel de Rothschild, sold Sotheby's, New York, 3 December 1997, lot 104; another example in the Residenz, Munich (G. Hojer and H. Ottomeyer, Die Möbel der Residenz München: Die deutschen Möbel des 16. bis 18. Jahrhunderts, Munich, 1996, pp. 233-239); and one in the de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco (acc. no. 55.41.12). A cylinder desk with floral marquetry and of pure Neoclassical form with straight legs, formerly in the Doucet and Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections, was sold Sotheby's, London, 24 June 1988, lot 33.