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拍品专文
These torchères copy two out of a set of four, created in 1749-1751 by the sculptor Agostino Carlini (c. 1718-1790), which may be reckoned amongst the most spectacular carved rococo furniture made anywhere in Europe. Born in Genoa, Carlini went to The Hague in about 1748, to work for Prince William IV of Orange who had just been appointed Stadholder of the United Provinces. He made the four torchères, together with four side-tables carved with fauns, for the great mid-seventeenth-century painted hall, the Oranjezaal, in Palace Huis ten Bosch outside The Hague. This is now lived in by King Willem Alexander and Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, and Carlini’s carved furniture remains in situ there.
Reflecting Carlini’s Genoese training, the torchères are a vigorous tours-de-force which combine a bold overall form with naturalistic detail of dragons and flowering foliate branches. The torchères and the side-tables were made to support rock-crystal chandeliers which, when lit at night, must have given the huge painted hall a grotto-like appearance, befitting mid-eighteenth-century taste and sensibility. The Paris-trained architect, Pieter de Swart (1709-1773), was in charge of all William IV’s building campaigns. He was closely involved in the conception of the carved furniture for the Oranjezaal, but its final appearance, Italian rather than French in feeling, doubtless owes more to Carlini’s inventiveness than to De Swart’s overall guidance.
Prince William IV died in 1751; immediately his widow, Princess Anne of England, the eldest daughter of King George II, put a halt to his building activities which she deemed unduly extravagant. Carlini soon found that there were no other patrons in The Hague willing to commission the kind of grandiose furnishings, or vehicles such as carriages or sleighs, which he aspired to make, and he left for London in 1753 or 1754. At the time of the Stadholder’s death, two gueridons and two side-tables were left unfinished; Princess Anne had them ‘repaired’ by the sculptor from The Hague, Jean François Maas, and gilded by Anthony van Thiel only in 1756. Therefore, Carlini never saw the full set in its finished state.
Whereas Carlini’s four torchères display many differences amongst themselves, as is to be expected with freely conceived and executed furniture of this kind, the present torchères copy two of them down to the minutest detail. This is equally true of two others that were part of the same series, which was in its entirety offered for sale in 1976; together they meticulously reproduce the full eighteenth-century set. Apart from a few years around 1800, when Huis ten Bosch functioned as a National Museum, the torchères have throughout the nineteenth century never been on public display. Clearly, the artist who made them was accorded privileged access to them; unfortunately no trace has as yet been found in the Dutch Royal archives of permission given to copy the torchères. This may have occurred during the years 1856-1877 when Huis ten Bosch was used as a summer residence by Queen Sophie (1818-1877); she had much work done to the Oranjezaal, and had a preference for the rococo style. In the J. Paul Getty Museum there is another pair of these torchères, which was sold in Paris in 1963 (Palais Galliera, 9 December 1963, lot 93; Gillian Wilson and Catherine Hess, Summary Catalogue of European Decorative Arts in the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles 2001, p. 214, no. 429); like the present ones, their manufacture comes deceptively close to the originals. Another set of six copies, less well-made, belonged to Emperor William II at the Neues Palais in Potsdam; this is now in the possession of the town of Celle.
Reflecting Carlini’s Genoese training, the torchères are a vigorous tours-de-force which combine a bold overall form with naturalistic detail of dragons and flowering foliate branches. The torchères and the side-tables were made to support rock-crystal chandeliers which, when lit at night, must have given the huge painted hall a grotto-like appearance, befitting mid-eighteenth-century taste and sensibility. The Paris-trained architect, Pieter de Swart (1709-1773), was in charge of all William IV’s building campaigns. He was closely involved in the conception of the carved furniture for the Oranjezaal, but its final appearance, Italian rather than French in feeling, doubtless owes more to Carlini’s inventiveness than to De Swart’s overall guidance.
Prince William IV died in 1751; immediately his widow, Princess Anne of England, the eldest daughter of King George II, put a halt to his building activities which she deemed unduly extravagant. Carlini soon found that there were no other patrons in The Hague willing to commission the kind of grandiose furnishings, or vehicles such as carriages or sleighs, which he aspired to make, and he left for London in 1753 or 1754. At the time of the Stadholder’s death, two gueridons and two side-tables were left unfinished; Princess Anne had them ‘repaired’ by the sculptor from The Hague, Jean François Maas, and gilded by Anthony van Thiel only in 1756. Therefore, Carlini never saw the full set in its finished state.
Whereas Carlini’s four torchères display many differences amongst themselves, as is to be expected with freely conceived and executed furniture of this kind, the present torchères copy two of them down to the minutest detail. This is equally true of two others that were part of the same series, which was in its entirety offered for sale in 1976; together they meticulously reproduce the full eighteenth-century set. Apart from a few years around 1800, when Huis ten Bosch functioned as a National Museum, the torchères have throughout the nineteenth century never been on public display. Clearly, the artist who made them was accorded privileged access to them; unfortunately no trace has as yet been found in the Dutch Royal archives of permission given to copy the torchères. This may have occurred during the years 1856-1877 when Huis ten Bosch was used as a summer residence by Queen Sophie (1818-1877); she had much work done to the Oranjezaal, and had a preference for the rococo style. In the J. Paul Getty Museum there is another pair of these torchères, which was sold in Paris in 1963 (Palais Galliera, 9 December 1963, lot 93; Gillian Wilson and Catherine Hess, Summary Catalogue of European Decorative Arts in the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles 2001, p. 214, no. 429); like the present ones, their manufacture comes deceptively close to the originals. Another set of six copies, less well-made, belonged to Emperor William II at the Neues Palais in Potsdam; this is now in the possession of the town of Celle.