CIRCA 1775

This popular form of mantelpiece 'bronze' garniture, of youthful gardeners bearing flower-pot candle branches, reflect the subject of 'enfants jardiniers' promoted in the 1760s by Boucher's designs for seats to accompany his 'Loves of the Gods' tapestries. These tulip-bearers correspond to the ormolu 'Girandole...à enfant[s] portent des Tulippes', as noted in a Parisian stock-list drawn up between the maître-doreur Jacques Goyer and his father the maître-èbèniste Jean Goyer in 1789. A related pair of candelabra with porphyry bases is in the James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor, a further pair in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London and another in the Musée du Louvre, Paris. Further related examples offered at auction include a pair with porphyry bases, sold anonymously, Christie's, New York, 21 October 1997, lot 215 ($21,850 including premium) and a virtually identical pair from the collection of Giorgio Marsan and Umberta Nasi, offered, Christie's, London, 12-13 December 2007, lot 404.