THE CASE CIRCA 1750, THE MOVEMENT AND DIAL CIRCA 1820-1830

The elegantly reclining figure on this clock is identical to that on a pair of chenets in the Palazzo del Quirinale, Rome, almost certainly originally supplied to Madame Infante, Louis-Elizabeth of France, Duchesse de Parme, for the Palazzo di Colorno. These chenets were likely to have been supplied by the celebrated bronzier Jacques Caffieri, who delivered superb bronzes d'ameublement to Madame Infante for Colorno, including the celebrated chandeliers now in the Wallace Collection. It is also interesting to note that in the inventory taken at Caffieri's death in 1755, a pair of chenets was described as un autre modèle de garniture de gril représentant un Chinois et une Chinoise (see A. González-Palacios, Il Patrimonio Artistico del Quirinale: Gli Arredi Francesi, Milan, 1995, p. 271, cat. 71).

Other clocks of this model include one sold from the Elizabeth Parke Firestone Collection, Christie's, New York, 22-23 March 1991, lot 873; another, previously in the collections of Georges Wildenstein and Akram Ojjeh, sold Christie's, London, 12 December 2002, lot 44; one sold from the collection of Ilhamy Hussein Pacha, Ader, Tajan, Paris, 15 March 1993, lot 442; a further example is illustrated in P. Kjellberg, La Pendule Française, Paris, 1997, p. 117, ill. G.; and finally one with a patinated bronze figure, sold from the Saunderson Collection, Christie’s, New York, 21 October 2005, lot 438.