A PAIR OF LOUIS XVI ORMOLU-MOUNTED CUT-GLASS VASES AND COVERS

This ormolu-enriched 'sacred-urn' garniture, designed in the 1770s fashion to evoke Love's triumph in Antiquity, comprises reed-scalloped and swan-egg 'crystal' glass vases that are enwreathed by diamond-cut ribbon-bands. Conceived as bacchic wine-krater vases nestled amongst Arcadian 'Pan' reeds, the vases' pearled and thyrsus-finialed dome lids are guarded by 'Apollo' swans, which bear the deity's Mt. Parnassus laurels that garland bacchic ram masks. The brand of the rue Bar-du-Bac fondeur-ciseleur Antoine-Philippe Pajot (d.1781) has been recorded on the mounts of similarly cut vases from the collection of Mrs. Elizabeth Parke Firestone (sold Christie's New York, 16 March 1991, lot 868). A blue glass vase, with similar palm and laurel-wreathed mounts to the latter, was formerly in the collection of Sigismond Bardac (sold Paris, 10 May 1920, lot 60). The 1777 inventory of Pajot's premises records his manufacture of such vases in 'cristal de roche' for the rue Meslée marchand-mercier Antoine Magnier.