A Louis XVI Style Cut-Glass Basket Chandelier With Jasperware Plaques

Object Description

A Louis XVI Style Gilt-Bronze and Cut-Glass Basket Chandelier With Jasperware Plaques, In the Manner of Pierre Gouthière.

French, Circa 1900.

The Chandelier has five external and nine internal light fitments.

This fine chandelier has a gilt-bronze leaf cast corona above a patinated bronze band with applied gilt-bronze stars suspending chains of cut-glass drops above a central patinated bronze band with gilt-bronze acanthus and circular japserware plaques, issuing five scrolling acanthus wrapped arms headed by goat heads and terminating in leaf cast sconces and folaite drip trays, the lower basket section hung with graduated drops and terminating in a knopped finial.

The goat head terminals to each candlearm are based on the design by Pierre Gouthière for a pair of appliqués made for the Salon Trianon at Versailles for Marie Antoinette. A preliminary drawing for the appliques survives in the collection of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris and is reproduced as Fig. 4.5.4 in Hans Ottomeyer and Peter Pröschel’s, ‘Vergoldete Bronzen’.

Object History

Pierre Gouthière (1732 – 1813) son of a saddle maker, rose to become the most famous Parisian bronze chaser and gilder of the late 1700s, receiving commissions from some of the leading connoisseurs of his day. Like many successful apprentices, he married the widow of his first employer and took over his establishment. Success came quickly, and in November 1767 he received the title of doreur du roi (Gilder to the King) from Louis XV. Gouthière also supplied works to the Comte d’Artois, the Marquis de Marigny, and the marchand mercier Dominique Daguerre, among others.

Gouthière was a master of chasing and invented a new type of gilding that left a matte finish. He combined polished with matte finishes to create varied effects on the surfaces of his bronzes. He made many types of objects, including furniture mounts, ornaments for mantelpieces and coaches, and mounts for porcelain or marble vases.

Object Literature

Ottomeyer, Hans & Pröschel, Peter. Vergoldete Bronzen, Vol. I, Klinkhardt & Biermann (Munich), 1986; p. 241, fig. 4.5.4

Object Details