An Italian Neoclassical Giltwood and Reverse Painted Glass Console Table, Sicilian, Late 18th Century

with a rectangular Rosso Levanto and Breccia Pernice marble top surrounded on three sides by a giltwood border, on an egg-and-dart moulding above a bead-and-reel framed frieze inset with reverse painted glass panels imitating gilt-veined onyx, the corners with giltwood lion masks, the central panel with a female head flanked by two horn-blowing putti, the sides centred by fleur-de-lys, on a laurel frieze raised on square tapering legs surmounted with Corinthian capitals, inset with further reverse painted glass panels with gilt female terms.

An Aristocratic Sicilian Family (by repute);

Michael and Lady Anne Tree, née Cavendish, at Mereworth Castle, Kent, until sold;

Christie's London,  4 June 1970, lot 152 (Property of Lady Anne Tree);

Purchased from the above sale by Aveline, Paris.

Christopher Hussey, English Country Houses: Early Georgian, 1715-1760, London, 1955, p. 61.

This elegant and rare console table is in good conserved condition and is ready to be placed. The top has marks and scratches consistent with age and use, the gilt wood moulded edge is probably replaced. The table has been re-gilt but displays a very good aged tone with some minor losses. One of the term figures to the legs is a later replacement. The reverse glass has been partially re-backed and five of the panels have cracks, with some minor losses to the painting. With some old marks and scratches commensurate with age and use.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Comparative Literature

Alvar González-Palacios, “The Prince of Palagonia, Goethe and Glass Furniture”, Burlington Magazine, 113, August 1971, pp. 456-60.

Alvar González-Palacios, Il tempio del gusto. Roma e il Regno delle Due Sicilie, Milan, 1984, pp. 393-87, tav. 632.

Enrico Colle, Il mobile neoclassico in Italia, Milan, 2005, pp. 56-59.

James David Draper, “A Life at the Met: James Parker and the Collecting of Italian Furniture”, Apollo, 139 (January 1994), p. 23.

Christopher Gilbert, Furniture at Temple Newsam House and Lotherton Hall, Leeds, 1978, vol. II, pp. 456-57.

The present console table, formerly at Mereworth Castle, Kent (fig. 1) is an excellent example of a type of reverse glass painted furniture particularly favoured by the Sicilian aristocracy of the late 18th century. It is one of four identical console tables that left their original location at an unknown date; one of which is now at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (fig. 2), with a second at Temple Newsam House, Leeds, and a third one formerly also in the collection of Lady Anne Tree as a pair to ours.

Unlike the others, the present table appears to have retained the original trumpeting putti flanking the central mask from which casts were made that were later applied to the London and Temple Newsam tables, both having lost them in the past. The decorative scheme derives from one popular in Rome and Genoa at the time, which saw the insertion of marble inlays on the frieze and legs of the tables. The lavish ornaments, arranged in strict symmetry, are typical of early Neoclassicism: particularly effective is the juxtaposition in the frieze of an egg-and-dart border at the top with a continuous budding laurel motif on the bottom. Throughout are allusions to antiquity: the Roman foliage is a version of Corinthian capitals, while the gilt female terms on each side of the square tapering legs are Kanephorae, basket-bearing figures from ancient Greece representing unmarried young women who were given the honour of leading a procession. This can be read as a refined clue to Sicily’s glorious past as the heart of Magna Graecia, just as the popular lion’s head with a ring in its mouth found on the corners - an emblem of strength and majesty - is a typical reference to Ancient Rome.

These four console tables were almost certainly part of a larger suite of furniture most probably commissioned for an important residence in Palermo. This is alluded to by a pair of small console tables formerly in the collection of an aristocratic family of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies at Palazzo Agnello, Palermo, sold Christie’s Milan, 11 June 2001, lot 625 (fig. 3), now in an important Italian private collection. On a single leg headed by acanthus leaf capitals, these present the same faux-onyx panels and decoration, only with rosettes instead of lion’s heads. Worth mentioning is also a mirror displaying a similarly carved giltwood frame with beaded band and painted glass insets simulating agate, sold Sotheby’s London, 7 December 2010, lot 42.

Further examples of Sicilian furniture in the same technique include a pair of Sicilian console tables once in the Borghese Collection (illustrated in Colle, 2005, p. 57) as well as a late 18th or early 19th century carved giltwood, grey-lacquered mirror with painted glass imitating violet marble, sold Sotheby’s London, 15 December 1999, lot 203. Also related are a further console table at Villa Favorita, Palermo (illustrated in González-Palacios, 1984, p. 385) and an impressive set of at least thirty side chairs and four settees, with panels imitating agate and marbles, all bearing the as yet unidentified monogram PPL, probably executed at a slightly later date than the tables. Twenty-four pieces were in the collection of the Earl of Derby at Derby House, London. Sold in 1940, these ended up in various institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and the Chicago Art Institute.

Painted glass seeking to emulate marble is characteristic of Southern Neoclassicism, and stems from the long-established custom of faux-marble painted wood furniture. Instead of applying a gold leaf to the glass, as in the original verre églomisé technique, Sicilian artisans would cleverly use marbled paper and lacquered dyes. Today, the most monumental examples of such technique remain in two late-18th century altars, one in the Chiesa di Santa Chiara, Enna, the other in the Duomo di San Giorgio at Ragusa Ibla, both illustrated in Colle, 2005, p. 58.

THE MYTH SURROUNDING VILLA PALAGONIA

The Villa Palagonia in Bagheria, near Palermo, Sicily, is among the earliest and finest examples of Sicilian Baroque. It was built from 1715 for Don Ferdinando Gravina, 5th Prince of Palagonia, by the architect Tommaso Maria Napoli (1659-1725), who also designed the nearby Villa Valguarnera. Around 1749 the eccentric 7th Prince began adding much of its famous decoration of grotesques, fantastic animals, and other creatures. Subsequently his brother, Salvatore Gravina, designed the mirrored ballroom that in the years to come would fascinate many a distinguished traveller of the Grand Tour. In his Italienische Reise (1787), Goethe commented upon the interiors: 'An exact imitation of these [agates], produced by coating the back side of thin glass panes with lacquer dyes, was the only sensible thing I saw in the Palagonia madhouse. They have more decorative effect than windows made with true agate, because instead of having to piece together many small stones, the architect can make the panes any size he likes.'

As the reverse painted glass technique described by Goethe and other visitors is clearly the same, a number of pieces have traditionally been given a Palagonia provenance. However, little is known about the long-vanished furnishings originally commissioned for the villa, apart from the fact that they were remarkably peculiar. As confirmed by scholars such as Alvar González-Palacios, (1971, p. 385) and James David Draper (1994, p. 23), there is no proof to support this attribution, not least because the aspect of much Sicilian furniture of this kind, including our table and the chairs mentioned above, is markedly Neoclassical, and could hardly have been designed for such a late-Baroque residence.

LADY ANNE TREE, MICHAEL TREE, AND NANCY LANCASTER

The third daughter of Edward Cavendish, 10th Duke of Devonshire, Lady Anne Tree (1927-2010) grew up at Chatsworth, Derbyshire; in 1949 she married Michael Tree (1921-1999), a good amateur painter who worked at Christie’s and the eldest son of Ronald Tree, the Anglo-American Conservative MP, and Nancy Lancaster, the celebrated tastemaker.

Under the direction of Lancaster, the newlyweds transformed Mereworth Castle into one of the most fashionable houses in England. Arguably the first and finest Palladian house in England, the castle was built around 1720-23 by Colen Campbell for John Fane, 7th Earl of Westmorland - an almost exact copy of Palladio’s Villa Capra “La Rotonda” at Vicenza, Italy. In the early 1930s the estate had been bought by The Hon. Peter Beatty (1910-1949), the English racehorse owner and breeder, and upon his death had passed on to his nephew Michael Tree.