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Torchère
Bullock, George, born 1782 - died 1818 - Enlarge image
Torchère
- Place of origin:
London, England (made)
- Date:
1816-1818 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
Bullock, George, born 1782 - died 1818 (designer)
- Materials and Techniques:
[Light fitting] Glass and silvered metal
[Torchère] Pollard oak veneer, with ebonised and gilt gesso details - Museum number:
W.39A/1 to A/4-1987
- Gallery location:
British Galleries, room 120, case 20
Object Type
A torchère is a tall stand used for candles or lamps. This example is fitted with candle arms and glass pendants to increase the effect of light. It combines the use of pollard oak, a native wood, with exotic and Classical decoration, including a Greek key design and inverted lotus leaves.
Time
Imposing candle stands were fashionable in Regency Britain. The Prince Regent, later George IV, included them among the lavish furnishing of his London home, Carlton House, as shown in views of the interiors published by W.H. Pyne in The History of Royal Residences (1819). In 1812, Rudolph Ackermann's Repository of the Arts, a fashionable periodical, illustrated a stand similar to this torchère, but with a simpler light fitting. George Bullock's stock in 1819 included several elaborate examples.
People
George Bullock (1782/3-1818) was an innovative designer who moved to London in 1812 from Liverpool, where he had already established a business as a sculptor, modeller and cabinet-maker. His house-furnishing business included commissions from the novelist and antiquary Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford in the Scottish Borders, and from M.R. Boulton of Great Tew Park, Oxfordshire. Bullock's most important commission for furniture was from the British Government for the house on the South Atlantic island of St Helena to which Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled after Waterloo. This torchère shows Bullock's innovative use of native woods, and the solid, sculptural quality of his designs.
