Live Auction 5962Centuries of Style: Silver, European Ceramics, Portrait Miniatures and Gold Boxes
JACOB AXEL GILLBERG (SWEDISH, 1769-1845)
Lot 277

JACOB AXEL GILLBERG (SWEDISH, 1769-1845)

Closed28 November 2012

Price Realised

GBP 3,750

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JACOB AXEL GILLBERG (SWEDISH, 1769-1845)
Gustav IV Adolf (1778-1837), King of Sweden 1792-1809, in blue military coat with ochre facings and collar, silver epaulettes, black stock, wearing orders including the blue moiré sash and breast-star of the Royal Swedish Order of the Seraphim and the jewel of the Order of St John
signed and dated 'Gillberg f 1797' (lower right)
on ivory
oval, 2 9/16 in. (65 mm.) high, gilt-metal mount

Milena Freifrau von Bassus, in 1912.
Grand Duke of Hessen.
Galerie Fischer, Lucerne, 13 June 1956, lot 730.
Ernst Holzscheiter Collection, Meilen; part II, Sotheby's, London, 1 May 1980, lot 79.

Specialist note

Gustav IV Adolph, King of Sweden 1792-1809, was the son and successor of King Gustav III. His hatred of Napoleon led him in 1805 to declare war on France and he abandoned Swedish neutrality. After several ill-fated political manoeuvres, he was arrested in a military coup and forced to abdicate in 1809. He was exiled with his wife Queen Frederike of Baden and their children but divorced his wife in 1812 and spent 25 years travelling in Europe before dying in St Gallen. He was succeeded by his uncle King Charles XIII. The present miniature was painted in the year of his marriage to Friederike (1781-1826), daughter of Karl Ludwig, Hereditary Prince of Baden.
For further signed miniatures by Gillberg of the same sitter, see M. Olausson and J. Sjöholm, Nationalmuseum Stockholm. Svenska och övriga nordiska miniatyrer, Halmstad, 2001, I, pp. 199 and 211.