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Lot Essay
Pierre Garnier, maître in 1742.
SIMILAR WORKS BY GARNIER
This bureau belongs to a small group of furnishings by Garnier that can be characterized by austere neoclassicism and strong architectural qualities. Other works forming this group include a an almost identical desk most recently in the collection of Lily and Edmond J. Safra, sold Sotheby’s, New York, 19 October 2011, lot 730; a commode, see P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Français du XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1989, p. 341, fig. D; a chiffonnier; and a pair of commodes in the Swedish Royal collections at Gripsholm Palace, see C. Huchet de Quénetain, op. cit., pp. 100 and 49, respectively. The single commode illustrated by Kjellberg is particularly close to the Getty desk as it has a wide, distinctively horizontal format, its drawers are inlaid conservatively with simple brass stringing and are mounted with laurel leaf-cast ormolu ring pulls and flanked by narrow fluted pilaster with square bases and capitals. The Gripsholm pair, on the other hand, is more lavishly mounted with ormolu Vitruvian scrolls, and the drawers are fitted with ormolu flaming urns and Greek key pulls. However, it is still of similar proportions and is accented by fluted pilasters similarly to the Getty bureau and the abovementioned single commode. The fact that it was delivered for King Karl XIII might account for the more lavish exterior, while preserving an overall somber neoclassical appearance.
PROVENANCE
The 1782 inventory of the château de Passy, which belonged to the Président de Boulainvilliers, lists un bureau à cylindre de bois de palisandre garni de ses différents tiroirs, anneaux entrées et pilastres de cuivre. A year later, the same desk is again described as un secrétaire à cylindre de 6 pieds de long garni de ses tiroirs avec anneaux et mains, rosettes et entrées de serrure de cuivre doré d’or moulu le dit secrétaire en bois d’amarente et satiné. There are only two known bureaux that fit this description: this lot and the abovementioned Safra desk. The Getty and Safra desks are almost identical, with the major differences being to the base, where the Safra desk has freestanding feet and the gilt metal inlay to the roll top. Due to the lack of more precise information from the eighteenth-century inventories, and the great similarity between the two desks, it is impossible to determine with certainty which bureau hails from the collection of the Président de Boulainvilliers. Regardless, the present desk has illustrious provenance as it was once owned by the Earl of Caledon. Additionally, it has been suggested by Christophe Huchet de Quénetain, that the pencil inscription faist p. garny Lordin...sogard / faist 1767 faist a.paris on this lot has been added at the time of manufacture and that 1767 is the actual date of execution, see C. Huchet de Quénetain, op.cit., p. 98.
THE EARLS OF CALEDON AND TYTTENHANGER HOUSE
This bureau was presumably acquired by Du Pré Alexander, 2nd Earl of Caledon K.P. (1777-1839), styled The Honorable Du Pré Alexander from 1790 to 1800 and Viscount Alexander from 1800 to 1802, for his home at 5 Carlton House Terrace, where he housed his extensive collection of furnishings and fine art, which included Italian, Dutch and Flemish pictures, such as Van Dyck's Portrait of a lady with her child [then identified as the Marchesa Spinola], now in the Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio. Lord Caledon was one of the Irish Representative Peers and was both His Majesty's Lieutenant in County Tyrone and Colonel of the Tyrone Militia. He was appointed the first Governor of the Cape of Good Hope when it was ceded to Britain in 1806. Five years later, Lord Caledon married Catherine Yorke (d.1863), daughter of Philip Yorke, 3rd Earl of Hardwicke, and through the marriage he eventually came into the possession of Tyttenhanger House, St. Alban’s, Hertfordshire by inheritance upon her father’s death. Originally owned by the Abbey of St. Albans, the estate was granted by the Crown to Sir Thomas Pope under the reign of Henry VIII. Pope had no children and left the estate to his wife Elizabeth Blount, who in turn bequeathed it to her nephew Sir Thomas Pope Blount (1552-1638). Tyttenhanger house was built on the estate in the 1650s and passed down the Blount family and eventually came into the ownership of Catherine Yorke’s great-grandmother Katherine Freeman, the sister and heiress of Sir Henry Pope Blount, 3rd and last Baronet. Upon the death of Lady Caledon, Tyttenhanger was inherited by her daughter-in-law Jane, by whom it was bequeathed to her eldest son James Alexander, 4th Earl of Caledon, who died in 1898. The last Caledon heirs to occupy the house were Lady Jane Van Koughnet, the daughter of the 4th Earl, and her husband, Commander E. B. Van Koughnet, until her death in 1941. Tyttenhanger House was eventually sold in 1973 after its contents were dispersed by Ralph, Pay & Ransom, 27-29 June 1972.
PIERRE GARNIER
During the course of a long and illustrious career, Pierre Garnier embraced the range of evolving eighteenth-century French styles from Rococo to Neoclassicism. As one of the foremost ébénistes of the 1760s and 1770s established on the rue Neuve des Petits Champs, Garnier was one of the protagonists of the austere, architectural goût grec style, which had been introduced in such an uncompromising fashion by connoisseur-collectors at that time. As early as 1761, Garnier was producing furniture after the designs of the architect Charles de Wailly, with one piece described in L'Avant-Coureur as being 'in the Antique taste,' see A. Pradère, French Furniture Makers, Paris, 1989, p. 247. His other distinguished commissions include pieces for the Duchesse de Mazarin whose hôtel was renowned for being a vanguard of fashion and a 'temple of taste', and for the Marquis de Marigny, brother of Madame de Pompadour. Today, exemplary pieces by Garnier are held in such prestigious public collections as the Louvre, Paris, the Wallace Collection, London, the Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon, and the Huntington Library, San Marino.
SIMILAR WORKS BY GARNIER
This bureau belongs to a small group of furnishings by Garnier that can be characterized by austere neoclassicism and strong architectural qualities. Other works forming this group include a an almost identical desk most recently in the collection of Lily and Edmond J. Safra, sold Sotheby’s, New York, 19 October 2011, lot 730; a commode, see P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Français du XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1989, p. 341, fig. D; a chiffonnier; and a pair of commodes in the Swedish Royal collections at Gripsholm Palace, see C. Huchet de Quénetain, op. cit., pp. 100 and 49, respectively. The single commode illustrated by Kjellberg is particularly close to the Getty desk as it has a wide, distinctively horizontal format, its drawers are inlaid conservatively with simple brass stringing and are mounted with laurel leaf-cast ormolu ring pulls and flanked by narrow fluted pilaster with square bases and capitals. The Gripsholm pair, on the other hand, is more lavishly mounted with ormolu Vitruvian scrolls, and the drawers are fitted with ormolu flaming urns and Greek key pulls. However, it is still of similar proportions and is accented by fluted pilasters similarly to the Getty bureau and the abovementioned single commode. The fact that it was delivered for King Karl XIII might account for the more lavish exterior, while preserving an overall somber neoclassical appearance.
PROVENANCE
The 1782 inventory of the château de Passy, which belonged to the Président de Boulainvilliers, lists un bureau à cylindre de bois de palisandre garni de ses différents tiroirs, anneaux entrées et pilastres de cuivre. A year later, the same desk is again described as un secrétaire à cylindre de 6 pieds de long garni de ses tiroirs avec anneaux et mains, rosettes et entrées de serrure de cuivre doré d’or moulu le dit secrétaire en bois d’amarente et satiné. There are only two known bureaux that fit this description: this lot and the abovementioned Safra desk. The Getty and Safra desks are almost identical, with the major differences being to the base, where the Safra desk has freestanding feet and the gilt metal inlay to the roll top. Due to the lack of more precise information from the eighteenth-century inventories, and the great similarity between the two desks, it is impossible to determine with certainty which bureau hails from the collection of the Président de Boulainvilliers. Regardless, the present desk has illustrious provenance as it was once owned by the Earl of Caledon. Additionally, it has been suggested by Christophe Huchet de Quénetain, that the pencil inscription faist p. garny Lordin...sogard / faist 1767 faist a.paris on this lot has been added at the time of manufacture and that 1767 is the actual date of execution, see C. Huchet de Quénetain, op.cit., p. 98.
THE EARLS OF CALEDON AND TYTTENHANGER HOUSE
This bureau was presumably acquired by Du Pré Alexander, 2nd Earl of Caledon K.P. (1777-1839), styled The Honorable Du Pré Alexander from 1790 to 1800 and Viscount Alexander from 1800 to 1802, for his home at 5 Carlton House Terrace, where he housed his extensive collection of furnishings and fine art, which included Italian, Dutch and Flemish pictures, such as Van Dyck's Portrait of a lady with her child [then identified as the Marchesa Spinola], now in the Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio. Lord Caledon was one of the Irish Representative Peers and was both His Majesty's Lieutenant in County Tyrone and Colonel of the Tyrone Militia. He was appointed the first Governor of the Cape of Good Hope when it was ceded to Britain in 1806. Five years later, Lord Caledon married Catherine Yorke (d.1863), daughter of Philip Yorke, 3rd Earl of Hardwicke, and through the marriage he eventually came into the possession of Tyttenhanger House, St. Alban’s, Hertfordshire by inheritance upon her father’s death. Originally owned by the Abbey of St. Albans, the estate was granted by the Crown to Sir Thomas Pope under the reign of Henry VIII. Pope had no children and left the estate to his wife Elizabeth Blount, who in turn bequeathed it to her nephew Sir Thomas Pope Blount (1552-1638). Tyttenhanger house was built on the estate in the 1650s and passed down the Blount family and eventually came into the ownership of Catherine Yorke’s great-grandmother Katherine Freeman, the sister and heiress of Sir Henry Pope Blount, 3rd and last Baronet. Upon the death of Lady Caledon, Tyttenhanger was inherited by her daughter-in-law Jane, by whom it was bequeathed to her eldest son James Alexander, 4th Earl of Caledon, who died in 1898. The last Caledon heirs to occupy the house were Lady Jane Van Koughnet, the daughter of the 4th Earl, and her husband, Commander E. B. Van Koughnet, until her death in 1941. Tyttenhanger House was eventually sold in 1973 after its contents were dispersed by Ralph, Pay & Ransom, 27-29 June 1972.
PIERRE GARNIER
During the course of a long and illustrious career, Pierre Garnier embraced the range of evolving eighteenth-century French styles from Rococo to Neoclassicism. As one of the foremost ébénistes of the 1760s and 1770s established on the rue Neuve des Petits Champs, Garnier was one of the protagonists of the austere, architectural goût grec style, which had been introduced in such an uncompromising fashion by connoisseur-collectors at that time. As early as 1761, Garnier was producing furniture after the designs of the architect Charles de Wailly, with one piece described in L'Avant-Coureur as being 'in the Antique taste,' see A. Pradère, French Furniture Makers, Paris, 1989, p. 247. His other distinguished commissions include pieces for the Duchesse de Mazarin whose hôtel was renowned for being a vanguard of fashion and a 'temple of taste', and for the Marquis de Marigny, brother of Madame de Pompadour. Today, exemplary pieces by Garnier are held in such prestigious public collections as the Louvre, Paris, the Wallace Collection, London, the Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon, and the Huntington Library, San Marino.