Important Design

Important Design

View full screen - View 1 of Lot 222. ÉMILE GALLÉ | "FORÊT LORRAINE" DESK.

Property from the Private Collection of Lloyd and Barbara Macklowe

ÉMILE GALLÉ | "FORÊT LORRAINE" DESK

Auction Closed

December 12, 09:10 PM GMT

Estimate

25,000 - 35,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Property from the Private Collection of Lloyd and Barbara Macklowe

ÉMILE GALLÉ

"FORÊT LORRAINE" DESK


circa 1900

walnut, fruitwood marquetry, burled wood veneer, patinated bronze

signed Gallé in the marquetry

42½ x 30½ x 21 in. (107.9 x 77.4 x 53.2 cm) 

Please note the provenance of lot 222 is as follows: Private Collection of John Getty Christie’s New York, March 9, 2006, Lot 34 Acquired from the above by the present owner

Private Collection of John Getty

Christie’s New York, March 9, 2006, Lot 34

Acquired from the above by the present owner

Émile Gallé, "Le Mobilier contemporain orné d’après la nature," La Revue des Art Décoratifs, December 1900, p. 374

Françoise-Thérèse Charpentier, Émile Gallé, Industriel et Poète 1846-1904, Nancy, 1978, p. 89 (for a detail of the model)

Gallé, exh. cat., Musée du Luxembourg, Paris, 1985, p. 274 

Alastair Duncan, The Paris Salons, 1895-1914, Vol. III: Furniture, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1996, p. 228

Alastair Duncan and Georges de Bartha, Gallé Furniture, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2012, pp. 138-139

The “Forêt Lorraine” desk, first introduced to the public at the Exposition Universelle of Paris in 1900, is certainly one of the most significant desk models created by Émile Gallé. The never-before-seen works presented at the Exposition marked an important turn in his practice as a cabinet-marker. There, Gallé emphasized neoclassical shapes and forms, introducing designs with elegant proportions reminiscent of Louis XV and Louis XVI furniture. He also placed special emphasis on decoration and special attention to details, creating decors inspired by his homeland, visible here in the delicate marquetry adorning the front and side panels. 


The panels display flora from the artist’s native region of Lorraine and include various local species of orchids and sabot de Vénus, which are represented amongst natural landscapes that are characteristic of Eastern France: uncultivated forests, low hills and picturesque valleys. Carved and sculpted details adorning the feet and side edges of the piece further embellish this masterful example of Art Nouveau cabinetry.


Another version of the model is held in the permanent collections of the Musée d’Orsay, Paris. A particularly creative element from the Orsay model is the inclusion of verses by Charles Baudelaire’s L’Invitation du Voyage (1857) inserted into the marquetry, providing us with an idea of Gallé’s creative intent behind the desk’s visual imagery:

“Tout y parlerait / A l'âme en secret / Sa douce langue natale”

“All would whisper there / Secretly to the soul / In its soft, native language”


The quote is taken from one of Baudelaire’s most celebrated poems, which ironically makes no explicit reference to the Lorraine region, forests or orchids, but does mention “Gleaming furniture / Polished by the years” that “whisper [...] secretly to the soul." It seems that Gallé sought to capture the mood and atmosphere of the text through a figurative and poetic interpretation of an imagined nature, conveyed on this model through richly textured mahogany, fruitwood marquetry and evocative figurative elements.