Studio RT Ltd

Description

We are delighted to offer this superb pair of Napoleon III ormolu or gilt bronze candlesticks by the French foundry of Ferdinand Barbedienne, circa 1870s. The pair have circular bases decorated with raised leaves stems and pine cones, a slender ornamented column ornamented with swags of beads, the column topped with a neo-Greek bust of a woman and the finely ornamented sconce. The are fully impressed with the F.BARBADIENNE foundy mark to the back of the busts, as shown.

Ferdinand Barbedienne (6 August 1810–21 March 1892) was a French metalworker and manufacturer, who was well known as a bronze founder.

The son of a small farmer from Calvados, he started his career as a dealer in wallpaper in Paris. In 1838 he went into partnership with Achille Collas (1795-1859), who had just invented a machine to create miniature bronze replicas of statues. Together they started a business selling miniatures of antique statues from museums all over Europe, thus democratising art and making it more accessible to households. From 1843 they extended their scope by reproducing the work of living artists and also diversified by making enamelled household objects. With the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870 the firm briefly had to switch to cannon founding owing to the shortage of metals but resumed business afterwards. Following Barbedienne's death in 1892, he was buried in the Pere-Lachaise cemetery in Paris and the firm was carried on by his nephew Gustave Leblanc until 1952.

Among the principal artists reproduced by the firm were Antoine Louis Barye, August Rodin and Emmanuel Fremiet.

We found two pairs of these for sale in France at some cost, one bronze/gilt bronze and the other all gilt bronze, as these are. The only difference being that the tops were missing from both.

Height: 9 1/8" - 23.2cm

Diameter of base: 3 7/8" - 9.9cm

Weight: 1.16lb - 526g each

Condition: Very good with no wear to the gilding.

Material: Gilt bronze/ormolu