Un importante par de antorchas monumentales de madera dorada

Descripción

An Important Pair of Monumental Giltwood Torchères, After the Model By Jacques Gondoin For the Hall of Mirrors At the Palace of Versailles.

Each torchère has a concave sided base with three carved putti figures supporting a central stem carved with a vase and floral garlands. Each torchère supports a gilt-bronze thirty-one light candelabra with a vase shaped stem with scrolling branches and foliate drip trays.

The torchères are carved after the celebrated models designed by Jacques Gondoin (1737-1818) architect and designer at the Garde-Meuble, for the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles in 1769. The original models were turned by Derny (active in 1769) and carved by Foliot Toussaint (1715-1798),

The torchères were commissioned by Louis XV for a masked ball held in May 1770 to celebrate the marriage of the Dauphin, the future Louis XVI, to Marie-Antoinette. Half of the torchères were designed as the present model with three dancing putti figures, while the others were designed as female figures holding cornucopia. After Louis XVI was moved to Paris, under the supervision of the National Guard in 1789, a pair of the putti torchères were installed in his bedroom at the Tuileries. When Louis- Phillipe refurbished Louis XVI’s bed chamber at Versailles, the torchères were included in the decorative scheme.