Lot 1003* - A211 Glamour and Sophistication: Luxury in 19th-Century Paris - Thursday, 28. November 2024, 10.00 AM
MONUMENTAL MANTEL CLOCK WITH THE ALLEGORIES OF DAY AND NIGHT
Napoleon III, Paris, last quarter of the 19th century. The movement is marked Jappy & Cie.
“Rouge de France” marble and gilt bronze with dark green patina. Stepped architectural case with a vase finial flanked by two seated bronze figures, allegories of Day and Night after designs by Michelangelo for the tomb epitaph of Giuliano de' Medici. The lidded vase with three ram legs and ram heads and vine tendrils. On a rectangular, rounded marble base with a central projection, on flattened, gadrooned feet. Decorated with cornucopias, drapery and reliefs with playing putti. White enamel dial painted with a flower garland. Parisian movement with half-hour strike on bell (pendulum missing).
H 67 cm.
Gilding partly reworked. Movement needs to be checked.
The two bronze figures that so strikingly adorn this pendulum are based on works by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564), which he created around 1530 for the tomb of Giuliano di Lorenzo de Medici in the Medici Chapel in Florence. The female figure symbolizes the night, while the resting giant represents the day.
Such allegorical representations of day and night were predestined to adorn a clock. Adaptations of Michelangelo's figures can be found, for example, on a pendulum clock attributed to the Parisian ébéniste André-Charles Boulle, which came from the estate of the Prince of Condé at the Château de Chantilly. This clock originally had a movement by Claude Dugrand-Mesnil, which was replaced in the 1780s by one by Jean-Baptiste Lepaute. It was originally created in 1720 by order of the Duke of Bourbon, who commissioned an entire interior from Boulle (Ottomeyer/Pröschel: Vergoldete Bronzen. Munich 1986, vol. I, p. 45, no. 1.4.4.; Jean-Dominique Augarde: Les ouvriers du temps. Geneva 1996, p. 197, no. 158). The archives contain various references to Boulle's work with this pair of figures. For example, on a design drawing for a Boulle cabinet (Ottomeyer/Pröschel: Vergoldete Bronzen. Munich 1986, vol. II, p. 481, no. 10.)
Similar pendulum clocks were sold at Christie's London, The opulent Eye, March 14, 2013, lot 171 and Christie's London, The opulent Eye & Carpets, November 26, 2013, lot 389.
The two bronze figures that so strikingly adorn this pendulum are based on works by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564), which he created around 1530 for the tomb of Giuliano di Lorenzo de Medici in the Medici Chapel in Florence. The female figure symbolizes the night, while the resting giant represents the day.
Such allegorical representations of day and night were predestined to adorn a clock. Adaptations of Michelangelo's figures can be found, for example, on a pendulum clock attributed to the Parisian ébéniste André-Charles Boulle, which came from the estate of the Prince of Condé at the Château de Chantilly. This clock originally had a movement by Claude Dugrand-Mesnil, which was replaced in the 1780s by one by Jean-Baptiste Lepaute. It was originally created in 1720 by order of the Duke of Bourbon, who commissioned an entire interior from Boulle (Ottomeyer/Pröschel: Vergoldete Bronzen. Munich 1986, vol. I, p. 45, no. 1.4.4.; Jean-Dominique Augarde: Les ouvriers du temps. Geneva 1996, p. 197, no. 158). The archives contain various references to Boulle's work with this pair of figures. For example, on a design drawing for a Boulle cabinet (Ottomeyer/Pröschel: Vergoldete Bronzen. Munich 1986, vol. II, p. 481, no. 10.)
Similar pendulum clocks were sold at Christie's London, The opulent Eye, March 14, 2013, lot 171 and Christie's London, The opulent Eye & Carpets, November 26, 2013, lot 389.
CHF 6 000 / 8 000 | (€ 6 190 / 8 250)
Sold for CHF 8 125 (including buyer’s premium)
All information is subject to change.