Enfilade

With the Constitution of the United States as ideologically charged as ever, it’s hardly a surprise that George Washington’s own annotated copy would sell for a record price — almost $10 million. While I’m glad to know that it’s going back to Mount Vernon, my hunch is that this hardly marks the end of the politicization of this crucial historical document. -CH

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As Patrick Hruby reports for The Washington Times (22 June 2012) . . .

Having set a world record, George Washington’s personal copy of the Constitution is heading home. A book containing Washington’s annotated Constitution and a draft of the Bill of Rights was purchased for almost $10 million by the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association in an auction Friday [22 June 2012] at Christie’s in New York.

Printed and bound in 1789, the book featuring Washington’s signature on the title page sold for a winning bid of $9,826,500 — an amount the venerable auction house said was a world auction record for an American book or historical document.

Part of Washington’s original private library at Mount Vernon, the book will once again be housed at the historic Virginia estate as part of the collection at the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington, currently under construction and set to open next fall. . .

The full article is available here»

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The Mount Vernon website provides an overview of the National Library for the Study of George Washington, including the following: 

The 45,000-square-foot library will occupy a 15-acre site to the west of George Washington’s historic home on the banks of the Potomac River. A drive winding through a woodland of native trees and plantings will lead to the building’s entrance court and visitor parking area. A 6,000-square-foot Scholars’ Residence adjacent to the library will provide living quarters for up to eight resident scholars. . .

Press release, dated 22 June 2012, from Christie’s:

Old Master and Early British Drawings and Watercolours  (Sale 5688)
Christie’s, London, 3 July 2012

Lot 68: Charles de La Fosse, A Mounted Soldier, Seen from Behind,  black, red and white chalk on buff paper, Christie’s Estimate: £20,000 – 30,000

Christie’s announced the sale of Old Master and Early British Drawings and Watercolours which will take place on 3 July 2012, during London’s Master Drawings week. Featuring a selection of works by Old Masters that have been recently discovered, this auction offers the opportunity to acquire drawings and watercolours which have not been seen in public for up to 100 years. Comprising 168 lots, the sale is expected to realise in excess of £3 million. Headlining an important group of newly discovered drawings by Rembrandt (1606-1669) and his school is A Blind Beggar with a Boy and a Dog (estimate: £50,000 – 80,000). This group of six previously unpublished drawings was discovered in the attic of a Scottish country house in 2012 and has not been seen for over 100 years.

Benjamin Peronnet: International Head of Department, Old Master Drawings: “It is always a thrill to discover and to have the opportunity to offer for sale previously unrecorded drawings. This group is particularly exciting as it includes a drawing by Rembrandt himself and six by his pupils. They offer a rare overview of his studio practices and how his pupils reinterpreted and developed his technique.” The group also contains works after Willem Drost and by Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627-1678). An intricate drawing by Ferdinand Bol (1616-1680), Jacob and Rachel, bears all the trademarks of Bol’s style depicting figures in historic dress and also shows the strong influence Rembrandt’s work had on Bol (estimate: £20,000-30,000). This exceptional group is expected to realise a combined total in the region of £100,000.

Further highlights include a rare survival: a cartoon by Michelangelo Anselmi (1491-1554) for his frescoes in the Cathedral of Parma. The frescoes have since been overpainted but this cartoon section of Putti dancing with hoops hints at the elaborate design that once filled the vaults of the Duomo and is the only surviving segment of the cartoons. It is expected to realise between £150,000 and £250,000.

Also on offer is a previously unpublished drawing by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696-1770) estimated at £100,000 – 150,000. This large-scale drawing includes preparatory studies for the figure of Mars and for a prostrate captive, both of whom appear in the fresco of Apollo and the Continents above the main staircase of the Residenz at Würzburg, considered to be Tiepolo’s greatest masterpiece. Between 1750 and 1753, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and his sons Domenico and Lorenzo executed a monumental decorative scheme in this palace of the Prince-Bishops of Würzburg, which had been completed only a few years previously.

Lot 69: Jean-Etienne Liotard, A Pensive Woman on a Sofa, tempera on vellum, pen and black ink framing lines on the left and top edges, on cardboard. Estimate: £400,000 – 600,000

Coming to auction for the first time is an exquisite work on vellum by Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-1789); Pensive Woman on a Sofa is based on a lost drawing of which only a counterproof is known, now in the Louvre. One of Liotard’s most compelling compositions executed on an intricate scale it is estimated at £400,000 – 600,000. The drawing was executed by the artist during his travels in the Greek islands and Turkey between 1738 and 1742. The subject sits in a pose which echoes Dürer’s Melencolia, with a crumpled letter discarded beside her, symbolizing the end of a relationship. Another pensive figure is seen in an imposing work by Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840), A Seated Man with a Telescope on White Chalk Cliffs, in which a tiny figure of a man is shown in a vast landscape looking into the infinite distance (estimate: £200,000-300,000). (more…)

Press release from Sotheby’s:

Treasures, Princely Taste (L12307 )
Sotheby’s, London, 4 July 2012

A gilt-bronze-mounted mahogany table “À l’Antique” designed by Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), attributed to Georges Jacob (1739-1814), Louis XVI circa 1785-89 (est. £200,000-300,000). Photo: Sotheby’s.

Sotheby’s London will hold its third Treasures, Princely Taste auction on 4th July, 2012 (L12307) . The sale will comprise an outstanding selection of rare and important furniture, silver, objets de vertu and tapestries, many with aristocratic provenance and each displaying the remarkable qualities of princely taste. The centrepieces of the sale are a historic gilt-bronze-mounted table by Jacques-Louis David (est. £200,000-300,000), which appears in a painting by David in the collection of the Louvre Museum, and the Shah of Persia’s golden elephant automaton clock, an 18th-century, British-made technical marvel and a dazzling sight (est. £1-2 million). The sale comprises 42 lots, which are estimated to realise a total in excess of £12 million. Mario Tavella, Sotheby’s Deputy Chairman, Europe, comments: “Each of the masterpieces in this, our third offering of Treasures, Princely Taste, has its own compelling story to tell. In the case of the table designed by Jacques-Louis David, its history is recorded for posterity in a painting in the Louvre which communicates not just its sophisticated craftsmanship, but the extraordinary partnership between one of France’s greatest 18th-century ébénistes and one of the greatest painters of the day. The extraordinary Shah of Persia’s Elephant Automaton, was created specifically to redress the yawning trade balance between Britain and China. All the works we have selected reflect connoisseurs’ continued demand for the very finest pieces at the top-end of the market. Many of these spectacular and meticulously sourced works have aristocratic provenances, and represent the very pinnacle of the decorative arts of their era.”

Sale Highlights

Jacques-Louis David, The Lictors Bring to Brutus the Bodies of His Sons, 1789 (Paris: Louvre)

A gilt-bronze-mounted mahogany table À l’Antique designed by Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), attributed to Georges Jacob (1739-1814), Louis XVI circa 1785-89 (est. £200,000-300,000). This exceptional table appears in David’s famous painting Les Licteurs rapportent a Brutus les corps de ses fils of 1789, in the Louvre. David designed and commissiond various pieces of furniture to use in his paintings. These were executed by the prominent Parisian cabinet-maker, Georges Jacob, who crafted the chairs for Marie-Antoinette’s laiterie at Rambouillet. The table can be considered as one of the most important precursors of what would be defined as the Empire style. A brass plaque inside the pedestal tells that the table was left to David’s great
granddaughter by David’s grandson, Jules David Chassagnol.

The Shah of Persia’s Elephant Automaton Clock – George III paste-set ormolu musical automaton clock, ca 1780, signed by Peter Torckler (est. £1-2 million). Photo: Sotheby’s.

The Shah of Persia’s Elephant Automaton Clock – A George III paste-set ormolu musical automaton clock, circa 1780, signed by Peter Torckler (est. £1-2 million). This magnificent automaton clock of a rare and impressive scale stands over one metre tall and was probably acquired by Naser al-Din Shah of Persia (1831–96) in London in the 1890s. The Shah had been mesmerized by similar clocks he saw while visiting Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild at Waddeson Manor in 1889. It typifies the intriguing and inventive objects produced in London by skilled British craftsmen in the second half of the 18th century and would have originally been destined for the Chinese market. Promoted by the East India Company, such objects played a key role in lessening the trade deficit between Britain and China and were articles of tribute in Chinese society, where gifts flowed through the official hierarchy, passing through the system to superiors and eventually, the Emperor. Similarly ornate elephant figures were frequently found throughout the Chinese Imperial Palaces and a large number remain in the Palace Museum, Beijing. The iconography of an elephant supporting a vase on its back forms
the auspicious rebus Daping Jingxian, or Daping Youxian,
representing the message of Peace and Harmony.

Sèvres soft-paste porcelain vases, with gilt-bronze mounts attributed to Pierre-Philippe Thomire (1751-1843), ca 1788-90 (est. £600,000-1,000,000). Photo: Sotheby’s.

A pair of important gilt-bronze-mounted Sèvres soft-paste porcelain vases, almost certainly supplied by the marchand-mercier Dominique Daguerre, the mounts attributed to Pierre-Philippe Thomire (1751-1843), circa 1788-1790 (est. £600,000-1,000,000). This magnificent pair of vases is exceptional in both form and decoration. The rare sky-blue colour was developed specifically for Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette by the Royal Manufacture of Sèvres, during the king’s building and decoration of his Rambouillet estate. The design is by celebrated Parisian marchand-mercier Dominique Daguerre, who was the chief supplier to the court of Louis XVI, while the finely cast and chased gilt-bronze mounts can be almost certainly attributed to Pierre-Philippe Thomire, the renowned bronzier who made pieces for Louis XVI’s bedchamber at Compiègne and for Marie-Antoinette’s apartments at Versailles.

George III 12-inch diameter Selenographia, ca 1797 (est. £200,000-300,000). Photo: Sotheby’s.

A George III 12-inch diameter Selenographia, circa 1797 (est. £200,000-300,000). John Russell R.A., who patented this ‘moon globe’ in 1796, was a highly successful society portraitist, Royal Academician and painter to King George III and the Prince of Wales. Russell had a passion for astronomy and was so “stricken by the beauty of the Moon” that he devoted considerable time to observing, mapping and drawing it. This Selenographia apparatus accurately depicts the Moon, while a small globe of the Earth demonstrates the oscillations of the Moon in relation to the planet. The globe was first purchased by George O’Brien Wyndham, the 3rd Earl of Egremont (1751-1837), who also had an interest in science. The Earl’s mistress, ‘Mrs Wyndham’, was also a lady of great scientific repute and for whom much scientific equipment was purchased, so it is possible that it may have been purchased with her in mind. Only a few examples of Selenographia globes are known to have survived, and are currently held in prominent science museums in London, Oxford and Madrid as well as other private collections. (more…)