BY PIERRE-PHILIPPE THOMIRE, EARLY 19TH CENTURY

Details

A PAIR OF EMPIRE ORMOLU SIX-LIGHT CANDELABRA
By Pierre-Philippe Thomire, early 19th Century
Each with reeded vase cast with scrolling vine and leaf-tip banding, surmounted by a waisted neck with outscrolling egg-and-dart cast rim issuing scrolling foliate branches with leaf-tip drip-pans and a central flaming finial, flanked by scrolled handles issuing from foliage, on a circular spreading foliate-cast foot and a square stepped plinth decorated with ribbon-bound laurel wreaths and a foliate-cast base, each stamped 'THOMIRE A PARIS', probably originally with further tier of branches and the current flaming-urn finials later
21 in. (53 cm.) high (2)

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium, which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

Pierre-Philippe Thomire (1751-1843) studied in the late 18th Century under the sculptors Pajou and Houdon and the bronzier Gouthière. By the early 19th Century he had become famous for his gilt-bronze furniture mounts, clocks, candelabra and other table decorations. Many special commissions were placed with him and clients visited his workshop to choose from various different elements to form decorative candelabra or indeed other bronzes d'ameublement.
A design by Gérard-Jean Galle of 1819 shows a closely related vase with reeded body, base and circular spreading foot wrapped in stylised acanthus (H. Ottomeyer, P. Pröschel et al., Vergoldete Bronzen, Munich, 1986, vol. II, p. 711, ill. 30).
An almost identical pair of vase-shaped candelabra was sold at Christie's, New York, 22 October 2003, lot 737.

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