A pair of Cressent parrot chenets

A pair of Louis XV chenets decorated with parrots
attributed to Charles Cressent – circa 1750 

Charles Cressent (1685-1768), maître sculpteur on 14 August 1714

Height: 34 cm. (13 ½ in.)     Width: 34 cm. (13 ½ in.)

Provenance

Collection of Mrs Anna Thomson Dodge, sold Christie’s London, 24 June 1971, lot 16

Comparative Literature

A.Pradère, Charles Cressent: sculpteur, ébéniste du Régent, Paris, 2003, pp. 204-206. 

Around 1750, Cressent took care to match his chenet models to the chimneys or sconces that surmounted them. The first sale he made of his own collection in 1749 includes two pairs of chenets matched with appliques of which the second pair’s arms featured parrots, suggesting that the chenets were decorated likewise (nos. 35 and 36 in Pradère, op. cit., p. 206). In Cressent’s second sale in 1757, three pairs of chenets are mentioned, the first two of which are matched with appliques, one of the two being again adorned with parrots (nos. 171-173 in Pradère, op. cit., p. 207).