Date: about 1705
Maker: cabinetwork attributed to André-Charles Boulle (1642–1732), satyr model by François Girardon (1628–1715)
Materials: oak, conifer, walnut, turtleshell, brass, gilt bronze and steel
Measurements: 79.3 x 120 x 50.5 cm
Inv. no. F424
Date: about 1705
Maker: cabinetwork attributed to André-Charles Boulle (1642–1732), satyr model by François Girardon (1628–1715)
Materials: oak, conifer, walnut, turtleshell, brass, gilt bronze and steel
Measurements: 79.3 x 120 x 50.5 cm
Inv. no. F425
Following the social and political upheaval of the Franco-Prussian War and Paris Commune (1870–71), Richard Wallace left France for England, taking with him a considerable part of his collection.
Hertford House, today home to the museum, was extended between 1872 and 1875 to accommodate this.
While building works were underway, he loaned much of the collection to an exhibition in Bethnal Green, including these two extraordinary tables, which the catalogue lauded for being ‘Old Boule work’ and of ‘singularly bold character’.
Their model is undoubtedly among Boulle’s most innovative, with four legs, richly decorated in marquetry, that flare wildly, while another two, like ancient Roman columns, ground the design, despite seeming to balance precariously on tapered feet. The legs support a single drawer and above that a marquetry top.
Boulle seems to have developed the model, intended to go either side of a chimneypiece or between windows, over several years.
It is possible he first conceived it to furnish the apartment of the duchesse de Bourgogne at the royal ménagerie in 1701, when he supplied a table strikingly similar in design.
What is certain, however, is that a drawing for an early version of the model survives in the Musée des Arts décoratifs, which shows an additional foot supporting the stretcher between the legs, a feature omitted, presumably for aesthetic reasons, by the time the Wallace tables were made.
This revised iteration is the one Boulle chose to publish as a ‘grande table’ in his Nouveaux Desseins de Meubles et Ouvrages de Bronze et de Marqueterie around 1708. He went on to produce numerous versions of these tables, often differing in size and decoration.
Their most impressive aspects are their marquetry tops, featuring fantastical designs inspired by Flemish prints, which Boulle collected in considerable quantity.
However, elements also seem to relate to ornamental designs created by one of Boulle’s sons, Jean-Philippe (about 1679–1744), perhaps suggesting he had a hand in making the marquetry as well.
The top of F424 derives from a design by Cornelis Bos (about 1510–before 1566). It depicts two oxen pulling a triumphal car with a canopy made up of floral swags, within which two cherubs push Cupid on a swing, to a tune played by musicians with bagpipes and tambourines. Elsewhere on the car, figures, including a monkey, play with parrots and stir up bees, while a flock of doves escapes from a cage.
For the top of F425, inspiration was drawn from a print by Pieter van der Borcht IV (1540–1608). It depicts the Tobbespel or Kübelstechen, a folk joust in the Netherlands and Germany in which a participant attempted to punch a hole in a bucket of water with a lance to avoid getting wet.
Yet here, the participants have been replaced with monkeys, who have set up their tournament next to tightrope walkers, musicians and merrymakers, which are like those on another Boulle table (F56) in the collection.
In the centre of the scene is a group of tropical birds contained within an elaborate cage that resembles the animal enclosures at the ménagerie. Intriguingly, pulls for both marquetry compositions, thought to have been taken from actual tabletops, are in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
The mounts are equally impressive. Skillfully chased and gilded, they show a range of imaginative motifs, including acanthus leaves, a female mask with plaited hair and laughing satyrs.
These relate to a design by Girardon, Louis XIV’s official sculptor, who had a studio in the Louvre adjacent to Boulle’s.
Girardon is known to have worked with Boulle to produce mounts of Father Time for clocks (F41 and F43 and F52), so it is likely he was involved in the creation of the satyrs on these tables, as well as the slightly larger versions on a desk (F427) in the museum.
Although not intended as a pair, the tables were grouped together at some point in the 18th century, as suggested by their matching locks.
Stamps indicate that they were also repaired during the second half of that century, F424 by René Dubois (1737–1798) and F425 by Jean-François Leleu (1729–1807), who probably added the perfume burner mounts to the stretchers.
Both tables first appear in 1870, when they are inventoried in the ‘Drawing Room off Staircase’ at Hertford House. The 4th Marquess of Hertford probably acquired them in England.