A GERMAN ORMOLU-MOUNTED MAHOGANY AND BURR-MAPLE SECRETAIRE A ABATTANT

Featuring elegant lines enlivened by exquisite gilt-bronze mounts and the most exacting construction, with removable legs and solid mahogany internal drawers, this secrétaire is a superb example of the fine neoclassical furniture produced by of one of the most successful and celebrated cabinetmakers of the late 18th century, David Roentgen (1743-1807). With its open superstructure and bold square form, this specific model of secrétaire appears to be rare in Roentgen's oeuvre. The closest example, all be it with a simpler interior consisting of open shelves and without an undertier, is in the collection of Coburg Castle (Veste Coburg), illustrated in Joseph Maria Greber, Abraham und David Roentgen, Möbel für Europa, Vol.II , Josef Keller, Bad Neustadt, 1980, p. 290, figs. 565-566. A somewhat differently designed piece with open side shelves, which is in Pavlovsk Palace, is shown by Greber, Op. cited, Vol. II, p. 270, no. 527, while a further piece with the same form, supplied to Empress Catherine the Great in 1786, is illustrated in Koeppe, Wolfram. Extravagant Inventions. The Princely Furniture of the Roentgens. Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition catalogue. New Haven/London, 2012, p. 195, cat. no. 60. Roentgen's successor, Johann Christian Härder (1749-1817), is thought to have produced comparable pieces of furniture - termed "Serre de Papiers” - which continued in his master's tradition.