Live Auction 7611Furniture, Sculpture and Carpets
A RUSSIAN BRASS-MOUNTED AND JASPERWARE PORCELAIN-INSET MAHOGANY DESK
Lot 132

A RUSSIAN BRASS-MOUNTED AND JASPERWARE PORCELAIN-INSET MAHOGANY DESK

19TH CENTURY AND LATER, THE PORCELAIN PROBABLY WEDGWOOD, EARLY 19TH CENTURY

Closed11 September 2008

Price Realised

GBP 16,250

Considering selling a similar item?

Discover its value with a complimentary estimate from our specialists.

More Information

How to sell

A RUSSIAN BRASS-MOUNTED AND JASPERWARE PORCELAIN-INSET MAHOGANY DESK
19TH CENTURY AND LATER, THE PORCELAIN PROBABLY WEDGWOOD, EARLY 19TH CENTURY
The rectangular stepped top with pierced gallery and urn finials, above three frieze sprung drawers, the three quarter-balustraded top with similar urn finials, above a beaded frieze centred by a plaque depicting classically-dressed figures, on fluted tapering legs decorated with mille-raies panels and headed by roundels
37¾ in. (96 cm.) high; 54½ in. (138.5 cm.) wide; 33½ in. (85 cm.) deep

Specialist note

The bureau-dressing-table is designed in Roentgen's Louis Seize 'goût Grèc' fashion recalling lyric poetry's triumph, and is china-railed with sacred urn-capped pedestals like the raised 'cartonnier' that is intended for a clock. While Venus-pearled libation-paterae enrich the fluted tablets above herm-tapered legs, their Egyptian striations recall the dress of the priestess Isis. The Etruscan-blue cameo was probably executed at Wedgwood's Birmingham manufactory and depicts the 'Choice of Hercules' with the triumphal hero ignoring a female figure, emblematic of vice, and choosing the high path indicated to the temple of virtue. This choice between the life of pleasure or of fame, was listed in Wedgwood's 1787 Catalogue as the 'Judgment of Hercules'. The Russian taste for such ornamental 'furniture' wares had been encouraged by the promotion of Wedgwood's manufactures by Lord Cathcart (d.1772), George III's Ambassador to St. Petersburg.