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Frame

1800-1850 (made)
Artist/Maker
Unknown
Place of origin
Italy (made)

Carved mirror frame of tabernacle form with an inner frame with a fluted moulding partly covered by a sliding panel with a profile female head within an oval; decorated with low relief masks and festoons, and twinned lateral protruding putto masks set on scrolling acanthus; on a gadrooned pedestal with scrollwork and putto masks centred on a cartouche; with a gadrooned entablature, and above a rectangular block with low relief scrolling acanthus centred on a grotesque mask.

The frame was acquired with a metallic plate, described by Robinson (1856) as 13" x 10 1/4". The plate not present 2008.

Object details

Categories
Woodwork
Frames
Mirrors
Object type
Frame
Materials and techniques
Carved walnut with burr walnut veneer
Walnut
Carving
Brief description
Probably Italy 1800-1850 in the style of Italy about 1550
Physical description
Carved mirror frame of tabernacle form with an inner frame with a fluted moulding partly covered by a sliding panel with a profile female head within an oval; decorated with low relief masks and festoons, and twinned lateral protruding putto masks set on scrolling acanthus; on a gadrooned pedestal with scrollwork and putto masks centred on a cartouche; with a gadrooned entablature, and above a rectangular block with low relief scrolling acanthus centred on a grotesque mask.

The frame was acquired with a metallic plate, described by Robinson (1856) as 13" x 10 1/4". The plate not present 2008.
Dimensions
  • Height: 42in
  • Width: 26in
From catalogue, approx.
Object history
Bought, with a metal mirror plate, from the Managers of the Guarantee Fund for purchasing the Collection of Monsieur Soulages of Toulouse for £200.

The frame is depicted in a watercolour view of Marlborough House, Second Room (to the right of the doorway), signed and dated 1856 by William Linnaeus Casey (1835-70), museum no. 7280.

This frame appears to have been made in the 19th century on the basis of the consistently smooth, fresh and even carved surfaces, and the use of brown toning to suggest greater age.
Lent to GLORIA DELL’ARTE: a renaissance perspective, an exhibition at Philbrook, Art center, Tulsa, Oklahoma, October 28th, 1979- January 27th, 1980
Production
The frame probably Italy 1800-1850 in the style of Italy about 1550
Bibliographic references
  • ROWE, Eleanor (ed.), Wood carvings from the South Kensington Museum. Folio IV. Domestic Furniture (London 1889), pl. LXVIII
  • London, South Kensington Museum: Ancient and Modern Furniture & Woodwork in the South Kensington Museum, described with an introduction by John Hungerford Pollen (London, 1874), p.193
  • J.C.Robinson, Catalogue of the Soulages Collection: being a descriptive inventory of a collection of works of decorative art, formerly in the possession of M. Jules Soulages of Toulouse; now, by permission of the Committee of Privy Council for Trade, exhibited to the public at the Museum of Ornamental Art, Marlborough House (London 1856), cat. no. 669
  • GLORIA DELL’ARTE: a renaissance perspective, an exhibition at Philbrook, Art center, Tulsa, Oklahoma, October 28th, 1979- January 27th, 1980 (Oklahoma, 1979), cat. No. 84
  • The South Kensington Museum. Examples of the works of art in the Museum, and of the decorations of the building, with brief descriptions. Issued in monthly parts, I-XI (1880), XII-XXI (1881), XXII (1882) [Vol. 1. Parts I-XII; NAL: VA.1881.0001] MIRROR FRAME. WALNUT WOOD. No. 7226—1860. I. 52 THIS fine specimen of wood-work, Italian of the sixteenth century, is useful not only as a type and style which may be copied or adapted for the same purpose, namely, for a mirror frame, but also for other articles of furniture; for panels of cabinets and the like. Mirrors in our own time are very much larger in proportion to the frames. The plate is metal, burnished, and is partly covered by a sunk sliding panel admirably carved in slight relief with a profile female head in classic costume. The frame is richly carved also in relief with masks and garlands of fruits and flowers resting on a bracket and surmounted by a cornice. On each side is the head of a boy, with a scroll of acanthus leaves above and below. The flat portions of the frame are inlaid with what appears to be cork, but is perhaps cut from the excrescences of a chestnut tree. Originally the large bracket had armorial bearings carved upon the shield which occupies the centre; but these have been defaced. This frame formed part of the Soulages collection. The height is nearly three feet and a half, by two feet two inches in width. Bought for 200l.
  • Frederick Litchfield, Illustrated History of Furniture from the Earliest to the Present Time. 4th ed., London and New York: Truslove, Hanson and Comba Ltd., 1899, illustrated p. 52.
Collection
Furniture and Woodwork Collection
Accession number
7226-1860

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Record createdMarch 10, 2008
Record URL
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O147033/frame-unknown/
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