BY JEAN-CHARLES SAUNIER, CIRCA 1760

Jean-Charles Saunier, maître in 1743.

Jean-Charles Saunier (d. 1766), was a member of a dynasty of cabinet-makers who were active from the 1730s until the end of the 18th century, including his more well-known and prolific son Claude-Charles Saunier (maître in 1752) and his brother Jean-Baptiste Saunier (maître in 1757). The family's atelier, located in the rue Faubourg Saint-Antoine, was established by his father Charles Saunier during the Régence and early Louis XV periods until taken over by Jean-Charles, who ran the business until the mid-1760s - probably both as ébéniste and marchand. He is also known to have provided furniture for tapissiers and the celebrated ébéniste Jean-François Oeben (d. 1763; P. Kjellberg, Le Mobilier Français du XVIIIe siècle, Paris, 1989, pp. 782-3). His son Claude-Charles, one of three brothers who all followed the same path into the family business, but the only one who was referred to as 'Saunier le jeune', was made master in 1752 but only registered his maîtrise with the guild upon taking over the atelier in 1765.

Compared to that of his more famous son, the stamp I.C. SAUNIER is found on relatively few pieces of furniture, all of sinuous outline, some incorporating floral marquetry and exuberant mounts, typical of the rococo style. They include: an early Louis XV ormolu-mounted kingwood commode, which probably passed through Saunier's workshop for restoration as it almost certainly predates his maîtrise, which was bequeathed by Charles Colman Tyrell Giles (1892-1953) to the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (acc. no. W.5:1 to 7-1954); a Louis XV marquetry table en chiffonière in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (acc. no. 1990.268.3); and a Louis XV tulipwood bibliothèque, sold Christie's, Paris, 14 December 2004, lot 109. The stamps of both father and son appear together on a pair of Louis XV kingwood and Chinese lacquer bibliothèques which were offered for sale at Sotheby's, New York, 22 April 2020, lot 177.

With its severe rectilinear outline - epitomising the nascent neoclassicism which emerged from the mid-1750s known as the 'goût grec' - the form of this commode is in direct opposition to the more sinuous examples of Louis XV furniture produced by the Saunier atelier during the tenure of Jean-Charles. It is probable, therefore, that this constitutes an early example of the furniture produced in the early 1760s at or just before the moment his son, Claude-Charles, took over in 1765.