Ref.10877
Beautiful antique Art Nouveau style chandelier in gilt bronze and molded glass with languid bodies and nine lights

This gilt bronze chandelier was made in the late 19th century. In accordance with the Art Nouveau aesthetic, curves and flowers constitute the decoration of this very worked art object. Two women and a man, surrounded by foliage and flowers, are represented in this imposing bronze piece. Their bodies are languid with vegetal volutes, indefinite curves and undulating drapes. The chest of the women with the widespread hair is discovered while the thin and juvenile torso of the man is exhibited. Through their nakedness, their languorous pose, the tranquility of their closed eyelids, emanates a certain sensuality. Modern reinterpretation of the Three Graces or simple representation of the personified nature, this chandelier is composed of Art Nouveau typical motifs. The Art Nouveau floral repertoire originated in the Japanese art discovered by Westerners during the 1867 World's Fair, which brought them a new and more abstract line, and new motifs, notably this obsession for nature. Associated with the taste at this time for mysteries and for the metamorphoses, the « woman-flower » them will be one of the most appreciated among the artists, as this luminary illustrates, whose the three bodies seem to be confused with the vegetation. Moreover, the chandelier itself seems to metamorphose into plants, as often in the Art Nouveau style. Nature, which may be a decor or a pattern, sometimes gives the shape of the object designed. Here, the classical structure of the chandelier is to a certain extent preserved, but in a "deformed" way: nature took back her rights. Thus, the lights have the shape of branches whose the ends are flowers made of pink glass, some are bloomed, others closed. This god and these goddesses of flora thus dress the chandelier, which ends in the lower part by a very preciousness glass beaded curtain, illuminated by a hidden bulb. This chandelier, where flora and men become mixed up, is characteristic of Art Nouveau aesthetics. The multiple arabesques and undulations that animate it give an impression of movement enhanced by the presence of light and its reflections on the glass. This movement is a recurrence in the Art Nouveau style and in its organic ornamentation, and the dancer Loïe Fuller will reverse the roles by giving body to a flower.

Ref.11612
BACCARAT Crystal - Chandelier with six lights

Important antique chandelier of the late 19th century made out of crystal by the Baccarat Crystal glasshouse. It is decorated with pendants, pearls, flowers and palmettes in crystal. The six arms of light are surmounted by globes decorated foliage and flowers. Superb quality and beautiful model of chandelier.

Ref.11312
Japanese style cabinet bottom decorated with birds and mother-of-pearl butterflies

Far Eastern-inspired cabinet bottom, with openwork and engraved decorative motifs, enhanced with gilded bronze openworked plaques. It opens with two flaps trimmed with mother-of-pearl panels decorated with birds and butterflies, with asymmetrical open shelves in the right and upper parts. Mother-of-pearl inlays from Tonkin are quite common in so-called "japanese" style furniture and are witnesses of a practice very common in the 19th century: the re-use. These inlaid panels were made in the Far East to adorn furniture. Imported in France, these panels were used by Parisian cabinetmakers at the turn of the century to decorate their own creations. The asymmetry of this piece of furniture is one of the hallmarks of chinese and japanese furniture in the late 19th century. This piece of Far Eastern inspiration is thus quite representative of the period known as "Japonisme", which expands in Europe in the second half of the 19th century, especially under the impulse of the World's Fairs .

Ref.13467
Willy Guhl, Rare pair of tooth planters, circa 1954

This rare pair of planters was made by the Swiss designer, Willy Ghul in the 1950's in natural fiber cement. It's the edition « Eternit AG/Elo, 1954 » which is shaped as an abstract triangle reminding a tooth shape. « Willy Guhl was an inventor, an experimenter, a resercher and a visionary. Despite that, he did not get lost in utopia. He reveals himself to be pragmatic almost a genius. » Robert Haussman Willy Guhl was part of these historical designers historiques who have contributed to the international reputation of the Swiss design. He was one of the big representative of Neo-Functionalism. From a carpenter father, he follows a furniture maker formation in the Kunstgewerbeschule of Zurich – School of applied arts of Zurich here he teaches from 1941 -, and becomes the director of the interior architecture department 10 years after. He leads in the late 1940's pionneer reaserches in the plastic furniture field. He develops then a knowledge about moulding technical that we allow him to reveal himself by transposing them on a new material : the Eternit, also called fibercement, which he is one of the first to use in Europe. The Eternit is a kind of cement reinforce by asbestos and with a fiber texture which allows to create audacious pieces with new shapes. It takes the aspect of larges slabs to which it is possible to give a shape as long as they are not dried. Produced in the origin for the industry, it's a cheap material with an important resistance, so perfectly adapted for the fabrication of external furniture.

Ref.13832
Louis Majorelle, japanese style display cabinet

Ref.14126
Pair of large, richly decorated Napoleon III-style double doors