Lot Essay
These marquetry commodes epitomise the elegant French style executed in the late 1760s by John Linnell (d. 1796), cabinet-maker and upholsterer of Berkeley Square. They evolved from the Louis XV 'picturesque' style introduced during the 1750s by emigré craftsmen such as Pierre Langlois (d. 1765), who was noted for making 'all sorts of curious (fine) inlaid work, particularly commodes in the foreign taste', in T. Mortimer's Universal Director of 1763. However, it was Christopher Fuhrlohg (d. circa 1787) and George Haupt (d. 1784) who, having trained in the Paris workshops of Simon Oeben, are thought to have introduced this particular style to the Linnell workshops in the later 1760s (L. Wood, The Lady Lever Catalogue of Commodes, London, 1994, no. 8).
Their inlaid tops display poetic laurel-and-palm wreathed trophies that recall festivities held at the Ranelagh pleasure gardens in London, and commemorate the singing of the celebrated tenor John Beard (d. 1791), for whom Handel composed. Such trophies, like the facades' ribbon-tied posies accompanied by butterflies, related to the fashionable French ornamental prints issued around 1760 by Francois Vivares, who advertised a large stock of books of flowers, birds, ornamental motifs and 'all sorts of the Best Borders, Festoons and Trophies'. Amongst Linnell's surviving workshop-drawings are two related commode-patterns, supplied en suite with pier-glasses. While the latter's flower-festooned frames are composed of ribbon-tied branches, corresponding to those featured on the facades of these commodes, one also exhibits a musical trophy (Victoria & Albert Museum, no. E.256 and E.253-1929, illustrated in L. Wood, op. cit, p. 103, fig. 96).
Amongst the closely related group of floral commodes, a pair accompanied by foliage-framed pier-glasses was almost certainly supplied by Linnell to his principal patron, the banker Robert Child for Osterley Park, Middlesex and was listed in the 1782 inventory of Mrs. Child's Dressing-Room (H. Hayward and P. Kirkham, William and John Linnell, London, 1978, vol. I, fig. 104). Two further commodes, almost certainly acquired by Catherine the Great, are recorded in the correspondence of Pierre Falconet, son of the celebrated sculptor, while acting as an agent for John Linnell at the Imperial Court in St. Petersburg. In September 1774 he wrote to James Triquet enquiring about the price of Linnell's marquetry corner-cupboards, and again on the 30 December, when he noted that although the Russian court considered two pieces of Linnell's furniture that he had taken for sale to be 'very beautiful', they remained unsold so he was contemplating their return to London. It seems more than likely, however, that these items remained in Russia, as they can be identified with the two commodes, displaying identical beaded borders to the tops, that are now at Tsarshoe Selo and Peterhof, St. Petersburg (Hayward, op. cit., pl. 9).
Of the closely related group dating from the late 1760s and early 1770s, a pair from the collection of Charles Jacoby was sold by his Executors in these Rooms, 23 June 1910, lot 134 (Wood, op. cit., figs. 100-101), while a further pair from the collection of E.M. Denny, Esq., probably commissioned for Traloe Castle (Castle Moyle), Co. Kerry by Sir Barry Denny, 1st Bt. around the time of his marriage in 1767 to his cousin Jane, heiress of Traloe Castle, was sold in these Rooms on 17 March 1921, lot 116 and again on the 15 april 1982, lot 84
Their inlaid tops display poetic laurel-and-palm wreathed trophies that recall festivities held at the Ranelagh pleasure gardens in London, and commemorate the singing of the celebrated tenor John Beard (d. 1791), for whom Handel composed. Such trophies, like the facades' ribbon-tied posies accompanied by butterflies, related to the fashionable French ornamental prints issued around 1760 by Francois Vivares, who advertised a large stock of books of flowers, birds, ornamental motifs and 'all sorts of the Best Borders, Festoons and Trophies'. Amongst Linnell's surviving workshop-drawings are two related commode-patterns, supplied en suite with pier-glasses. While the latter's flower-festooned frames are composed of ribbon-tied branches, corresponding to those featured on the facades of these commodes, one also exhibits a musical trophy (Victoria & Albert Museum, no. E.256 and E.253-1929, illustrated in L. Wood, op. cit, p. 103, fig. 96).
Amongst the closely related group of floral commodes, a pair accompanied by foliage-framed pier-glasses was almost certainly supplied by Linnell to his principal patron, the banker Robert Child for Osterley Park, Middlesex and was listed in the 1782 inventory of Mrs. Child's Dressing-Room (H. Hayward and P. Kirkham, William and John Linnell, London, 1978, vol. I, fig. 104). Two further commodes, almost certainly acquired by Catherine the Great, are recorded in the correspondence of Pierre Falconet, son of the celebrated sculptor, while acting as an agent for John Linnell at the Imperial Court in St. Petersburg. In September 1774 he wrote to James Triquet enquiring about the price of Linnell's marquetry corner-cupboards, and again on the 30 December, when he noted that although the Russian court considered two pieces of Linnell's furniture that he had taken for sale to be 'very beautiful', they remained unsold so he was contemplating their return to London. It seems more than likely, however, that these items remained in Russia, as they can be identified with the two commodes, displaying identical beaded borders to the tops, that are now at Tsarshoe Selo and Peterhof, St. Petersburg (Hayward, op. cit., pl. 9).
Of the closely related group dating from the late 1760s and early 1770s, a pair from the collection of Charles Jacoby was sold by his Executors in these Rooms, 23 June 1910, lot 134 (Wood, op. cit., figs. 100-101), while a further pair from the collection of E.M. Denny, Esq., probably commissioned for Traloe Castle (Castle Moyle), Co. Kerry by Sir Barry Denny, 1st Bt. around the time of his marriage in 1767 to his cousin Jane, heiress of Traloe Castle, was sold in these Rooms on 17 March 1921, lot 116 and again on the 15 april 1982, lot 84