STAMPED MARTIN CARLIN, CIRCA 1765-70, FORMERLY ENCOIGNURES, ADAPTED PROBABLY IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE 19TH CENTURY

Martin Carlin, maître in 1766.

Among the most iconic masterpieces of the Rothschild collections and examples of the most luxurious Parisian cabinetmaking of the 18^th century, these cabinets have been identified in the collection of the famous patron and avant-garde collector Charles-Nicolas Duclos du Fresnoy (1733-1794), Royal notary and councillor to King Louis XVI.

In Duclos du Fresnoy’s posthumous sale on 18 August 1795, these cabinets were described under lot 176, accompanied by a commode (lot 175), both described with the same decorative vocabulary including the Japanese lacquer panels, lion masks and caryatid satyr figures. The dimensions of the cabinets in the catalogue also correspond to those of the present lot, confirming this important provenance [39 pouces high = 105 cm.; 33 pouces wide = 89 cm.]. The pair were listed in this sale in the form of encoignures and would have been adapted into meubles à hauteur d’appui by a dealer, either in the early 19^th century or by a member of the Rothschild family in the course of the 19^th century. This new form enabled them to be placed more prominently in an interior, resulting in greater harmony between the sumptuous lacquer panels and the important Old master paintings and other works surrounding them.

The ensemble was precisely described in the 1795 catalogue:

175- Une commode à panneaux en vieux laque du Japon, à sujets de châteaux, paysages & pagodes de reliefs en or, ouvrant à trois vantaux, le haut à trois tiroirs, les angles à pilastres cannelés : elle est richement garnie de Satyres formant caryatides, consoles, frises à rinceaux d’ornements, masque de lion, cadres à feuilles & à oves, rosaces & branchages de lauriers ; le tout en bronze doré, posée sur quatre pieds aussi garnis d’ornements et boules en bronze doré ; le dessus avec tablettes en marbre griotte d’Italie ; hauteur totales 39 pouces, largeur 64 pouces 6 lignes, profondeur 24 pouces 8 lignes

176- Deux encoignures de même genre & ornements ; hauteur 39 pouces, largeur 33 pouces profondeur 28 pouces.

This group of furniture comprising a commode and a pair of encoignures was sold in 1795 for 81,000 francs, a considerable sum for the period and the highest price in the sale of Duclos du Fresnoy’s collection.

CHARLES-NICOLAS DUCLOS DU FRESNOY
A collector of unrivalled prestige, Charles-Nicolas Duclos du Fresnoy was a financier of renown and a councillor and notary to King Louis XVI. He was also notary to the painter Jean-Baptiste Greuze, who executed his portrait as well as that of his son, the baron Charles Athanase Walckenaer. Considered as one of the great contemporary art patrons of his era (C.B. Bailey, Patriotic Taste: Collecting Modern Art in Pre-Revolutionary Paris, 2002 p. ), Duclos du Fresnoy’s collection consisted of major works by a number of contemporary artists including Le Gâteau des Rois (Musée Fabre, Montpellier) and La Dame de charité (Musée des Beaux-arts, Lyon) by Greuze; Les environs de Naples pris dans le brouillard (private collection) by Jean-François Huë; La Fontaine de l’Amour (Wallace Collection, London) and l’Ile de l’Amour (Musée Gulbenkian, Lisbonne) by Jean-Honoré Fragonard; and even works by Simon Chardin and Joseph Vernet. In 1786 he acquired the l’hôtel de Beauchamps om the rue du Faubourg-Poissonnière where he installed a skylit gallery to display his contemporary art collection. Outside he designed a large English garden in accordance with the latest fashion. Frédéric Masson (quoted by H. Naef in his work on Les portraits du clan Bochet-Marcotte-Panckoucke par Ingres, 1958) explains: "M. Duclos Dufresnoy avait une clientèle fort aristocratique et il fut impliqué au monde du sport si bien que dans les grandes épreuves hippiques, il recevait les paris dans son étude. Il possédait l'une des plus belles maisons de Paris, rue du faubourg poissonnière, et les jardins en furent célèbres au point qu'on venait de loin pour les visiter. La maison existe encore ; elle est aujourd'hui le Lycée Lamartine"...

Interestingly, in 1788 he lent some six million livres to King Louis XVI during the financial crisis. In 1789 he was appointed a substitute deputy of the Third Estate at the Estates General and attempted to prevent the creation of paper money as well as proposing a project to save the Caisse d'escompte. Despite or perhaps because of his moderation, he was sent to the guillotine in Paris in 1794. His collections were inherited by his illegitimate son Charles Athanase Walckenaer.

MASTERPIECES OF THE GOÛT A LA GRECQUE
With their bold geometric outline embellished with rich caryatid, lion mask and laurel garland mounts, these cabinets were executed in the first years of Martin Carlin’s career and embody the early avant-garde expressions of neoclassicism in the 1760s and 1770s, reflecting the constant pursuit of innovation that characterised the activities Carlin’s production principally consisted of furniture mounted with porcelain which dominated of the Parisian marchands-merciers under the Ancien Régime. The use of Japanese lacquer panels of unusual luxury and great rarity for the period was probably undertaken by a marchand-mercier such as Simon-Phillipe Poirier or Claude-Francois Julliot.
This pair of cabinets is closely related to a commode attributed to Joseph Baumhauer, dit Joseph, which features the same exceptional chutes in the shape of caryatid satyrs. The latter, currently preserved at Windsor Castle, was recently identified as belonging to the collection of Pierre-Victor de Besenval (P. Gallois, ‘Baron de Besenval’s Eclectic Eye’, The Furniture History Society, Newsletter 221, February 2021, p. 9, fig 4). It was probably executed under the direction of the marchand Julliot who was probably also the originator of the Rothschild cabinets, in this instance in collaboration with the ébéniste Martin Carlin whose stamp the cabinets bear. Carlin will undoubtedly have been aware of Baumhauer’s pioneering role in developing the goût à la grecque and might even have seen his earliest pieces in this style, the monumental ensemble made circa 1756-’58 for Ange-Laurent Lalive le Jully, now at château de Chantilly. One can therefore assume that during the off-set of his career – immediately after becoming master in 1766 - Carlin’s style veered towards Joseph’s boldest examples before developing his own signature style. This experimental phase will have lasted a few years, and this allows us to date the Rothschild cabinets to circa 1766-70.

Martin Carlin (1730-1785) subsequently developed into one of the most brilliant ébénistes of his generation. His career saw a meteoric rise characterised by talent and creativity. Within a short space of time he worked exclusively for the most inventive and exacting marchands-merciers. This connection enabled him access to the rarest and choicest materials as well as exposure to a clientele anxious to acquire the most exceptional furniture. Early in his career but after the production of the Rothschild cabinets, until the end of the 1770s and beginning of the 1780s when he again began to mount furniture with rare panels of Japanese lacquer , although on a smaller scale than in his early years. This material saw renewed interest in France under the influence of Marie-Antoinette who added to the collection of Japanese lacquer objects she had inherited in 1780 from her mother the Empress Maria-Theresa of Austria. With the aid of the intermediaries the frères Darnault, Carlin enriched the interiors of the great collectors of France with pieces adorned with refined panels from the Far East. For example, he delivered a set of furniture in Japanese lacquer for Mesdames at the château de Bellevue, currently preserved in the musée du Louvre (inv. OA 5467, 5470, 5498, 5499).