A Circassian Walnut Renaissance Revival Chimney Piece

c.1876

A CIRCASSIAN WALNUT RENAISSANCE REVIVAL CHIMNEY PIECE made for the Dining Room at Chateau-sur-Mer by Luigi Frullini (Italian, 1839-1897) with a faience tile surround designed by Eugène Glück (French, 1820-1898) for Theodore Deck Manufacture, Paris. The flanking cabinets of the chimney piece feature bas-relief grape cluster carvings and support a frieze with Leonine masks and projecting cherubic heads based on those of the Cantoria at the Duomo of Florence. The over-mantel shelf of Bacchic revelry consists of pendant griffons with ewers backed against a bat-winged scallop shell, against which three putti cavort. One of these putti sits clutching a grape cluster, another stands drinking from a wine cask, while the third sits atop the cask holding its cups aloft. The faience surround designed by Glück depicts a boar and stag hunt in the court of Henri IV of France. Glück favored medieval subjects and, as here, hunting scenes, some adapted from Antonio Tempesta (Italian, 1555-1630). The present hunt scene appears to be based on Tempesta's etching "Acteon a propriis canibus discerpitur" of 1606.

Italian

French

Circasian walnut

Glazed earthenware tiles

115" x 125"

Purchased by The Preservation Society of Newport County, 1969.

PSNC.11552

Antiques Magazine, April 1995 plate XIII P. 577.