Ref.10452
Rare Art Nouveau ceramic stool with chestnut leaves decor

Rare antique ceramic stool decorated with leaves of chestnut trees and their bugs of Art Nouveau style realized around 1900.

Ref.3131
Beautiful antique Louis XV style fireplace with opulent decor in white Carrara marble

This beautiful Louis XV style fireplace was made in the 19th century. Its entablature is decorated with an opulent shell from which escape acanthus leaves overflowing on the panels. These are carved with an original and regular geometric pattern, which provides an additional texture. The movement emanating from the shell is reflected in the large scrolls of the consoles. They are covered with foliage from which are born smaller leaves, falling on the consoles. The plinths are also curved, animated with curves and counter-curves.

Ref.4986
Louis XV period mantel in Rouge Royal marble

Ref.15551
Gustave VANAISE, Innocence, 1884

This painting titled Innocence was created by Gustave Vanaise in 1884. Gustave Vanaise (Ghent, 1854-Saint-Gilles, 1902) studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent under Théodore Canneel, and later in Brussels. He notably produced historical paintings, portraits, and intimate scenes; many of his works are preserved at the Museum of Fine Arts in Ghent. Vanaise participated regularly in the Paris Salon from 1879 to 1888; in 1884, he exhibited a Young Boy with a Pigeon, which may be this very piece. This work is an allegory of Innocence. Against a backdrop of a luminous yellow cloth stands the figure of a young boy lying on the ground, propped up on his elbows; his youth and nudity, both symbols of innocence, are further emphasized by the dove he holds in his left hand, a symbol of purity. The boy seems about to kiss the bird on the beak. The scene is completed on the right by a low-relief representing a gentle Madonna and Child, set against the background. The artist’s choice of subject and treatment place this work at the boundary between allegory and intimate scene, a genre in which the painter excelled: the presence of the yellow sheet in the background, intended to close the scene, adds to the composition’s closed, intimate character, while the use of symbols and the presence of the Virgin and Child tend to place the work in allegorical painting. In a similar spirit, Vanaise painted The Bacchante, a piece housed at the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium. It depicts a woman crowned with ivy lying sensually on the ground, while a young boy resembling the one in Innocence – though likely a young satyr here – plays the flute.