Pair of candlesticks

Juste Aurèle Meissonnier

ca. 1745 · Gilt bronze · European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

A 1728 design for a candlestick by Juste-Aurèle Meissonnier (1695-1750) incorporated a pair of entwined children in its spirally twisted stem. The three drawings for this model were engraved by Louis Desplaces (1682-1739) and published in Deuxième livre de l’oeuvre de J.A. Meissonnier, Chandeliers de sculpture en argent in 1734. This highly sculptural model proved to be very fashionable and was executed with variations both in gilt bronze and in porcelain (an example from the famous Meissen swan service for Count Brühl of 1739 is on view in the German and Austrian Galleries).

Artist

Juste Aurèle Meissonnier

Date

ca. 1745

Medium

Gilt bronze

Culture

French

Department

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

Credit line

The Lesley and Emma Sheafer Collection, Bequest of Emma A. Sheafer, 1973