Napoleon III Gilt Bronze Mounted Boulle Style Marquetry Cabinet, Winckelsen

Attributed to Charles-Guilluame Winckelsen – After the model by André-Charles Boulle

Engraved brass, pewter, red and brown tortoiseshell première and contrepartie marquetry, surmounted by a marble top, the central paneled door opening to four drawers, below a bronze medallion of Louis XIV with the motto Ludovicus Magnus Rex, the sides each fitted with four drawers, raised on spiral-turned feet.

This meuble d’appui belongs to a group of important 19th century cabinets derived from celebrated models attributed to André-Charles Boulle circa 1685, today in the collections of the Louvre, and seen in a workshop preparatory drawing for a cabinet on Stand now in the in the Musée des Arts décoratifs, Paris.
Boulle’s enduring popularity and influence is evidenced in a number of exceptional 19th century versions of his work, and that his first revival period took place as early as the 1760s, when ébénistes such as Etienne Levasseur, Philippe-Claude Montigny and Adam Weisweiler, restored and adapted existing Boulle cabinets, and incorporated panels of late 17th-early 18th century Boulle marquetry into new forms. Several cabinets of this type were produced in the 18th century, including a pair by Etienne Levasseur circa 1775 , around eight years after he restored the pair in the Louvre. Formerly the property of the 4th Marquess of Hertford and now in the Wallace Collection, Levasseur’s pair differs from the present cabinet in several ways, most noticeably in that they do not have a rectangular plinth inserted between the lower door and the feet. On the Boulle original this was inserted at the behest of King Louis Phillipe circa 1839, in his efforts to standardize the height of the Boulle cabinets in the Louvre collection.

The pair in the Wallace Collection was exhibited at the Musée rétrospectif de Paris in 1865, where they would have certainly renewed the interest of leading 19th century French cabinetmakers in copying and transforming works by Boulle. Examples include one by Alexandre-Georges Fourdinois exhibited at the 1878 Exposition Universelle, a mid-19th century English pair in The Frick Collection. The present cabinet bears very close comparison in the arrangement of the marquetry and form to the Dasson cabinets, which, given that Dasson bought Winckelsen’s workshop and stock in 1871, could lend weight to the Winckelsen attribution of the present cabinet. The excellently well-crafted oak carcass are also consistent with Winckelsen’s oeuvre.

Charles-Guillaume Winckelsen
Winckelsen made high quality furniture in the style of the 18th century during the 19th century. He was established at 23, Val-Sainte-Catherine, Paris from 1854 until his death in 1871. As a result of his comparatively short career little of his work is available today. All recorded items by this maker are of of the highest quality, especially the bronze work. Jean-Louis-Benjamin Gros was his main furniture maker and Joseph-Nicolas Langlois his chiseller.