Live Auction 5962Centuries of Style: Silver, European Ceramics, Portrait Miniatures and Gold Boxes
LEONARD ÖRNBECK (SWEDISH, 1736-1789)
Lot 276

LEONARD ÖRNBECK (SWEDISH, 1736-1789)

Closed28 November 2012

Price Realised

GBP 5,000

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LEONARD ÖRNBECK (SWEDISH, 1736-1789)
Gustav III (1746-1792), King of Sweden 1771-1792, in robes of the Royal Swedish Order of the Seraphim with gold belt, frilled white shirt, gold-bordered red cloak, wearing the blue moiré sash and breast-star of the Order of the Seraphim and the jewel of the Order of the Sword around his neck, the hilt of his sword below his left hand which rests on his hip, his right hand holding a plumed hat on a blue folio; interior background with pillar
on a thick sheet of ivory
oval, 3 5/8 in. (92 mm.) high, gilt-metal frame with silver reverse

Presented by the sitter to Countess Eleonora Fredrika Bielke, née Baroness von Dyben (1738-1808), Mistress of the Queen's Household ('överhovmästarinna') and second wife of Count Nils Adam Bielke, Member of the Royal Privy Council.
Untraced Swedish auction, 26-27 October 1939.
Christie's, Geneva, 10 May 1983, lot 251.

Specialist note

Gustavus III, King of Sweden, son and successor of King Adolf Frederick and Louisa Ulrika, sister of King Frederick II the Great of Prussia, ascended the throne in 1771. He brought about a sea of change with his reign and his court became a northern Versailles. He sent Count Hans Axel Fersen to rescue the French Royal family at the outbreak of the French Revolution and planned to use his Army to go to the help of Louis XVI but in March 1792, he was shot by Johan Jakob Anckarstm during a masked ball at the Royal Opera House and, in great agony, finally died of gangrene.
An old handwritten note on the reverse attributes the present miniature to Örnbeck but an alternative attribution to Pierre-Adolf Hall is also supplied.