A pair of French gilt-bronze three-light wall appliques circa 1890

the backplates in the form of a flaming torch surmounted by two billing doves and with ribbon-tied berried laurel wreaths, supporting three acanthus leaf cast candlearms, the central candlearms cast with a kneeling cherub holding a heart and with a tassle cushion on his head issuing drip pan and nozzle.  Drilled for electricity.

Comparative literature: P. Verlet, Les Bronzes Français du XVIII siècle, 1897, pages 380 and 381, where it is instructive to compare the 18^th century and 19^th century version of this model

F.J.B. Watson, The Wrightsman Collection, 1966, vol. II., p. 423, nos. 234 A-D, illustrates an identical set of four wall lights which were formerly in the Château de Champigny.  The model is by L. F. Feuchere and a pair of wall lights of this design were delivered for the Cabinet de Toilette of Marie-Antoinette at the Château de St. Cloud in 1788, which are now in the Louvre (catalogue no. 342, pl LIV)

Other examples are now in the Palais de L' Elysée, Paris, the Getty Museum, Malibu, and the Wrightsman examples are in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.