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A very fine late Louis XV gilt bronze mounted tulipwood inlaid marquetry table à écrire by Louis Moreau, stamped MOREAU and JME, the canted rectangular top inlaid with a shaped outer banding centred by wonderful ribbon-tied scrolled foliage and flowers above a feather banded frieze, the side drawer opening to reveal a pen tray, ink well, pounce pot and compartment, with foliate gilt angle mounts heading the cabriole legs terminating in scrolled sabots
Paris, date circa 1765
Height 69 cm, length 64 cm, depth 43 cm.
When in 1762 Denis Genty (maître 1754) was forced into bankruptcy, Louis Moreau (d. 1791) took over his Parisian ébénisterie shop at rue de l’Echelle-Saint-Honoré called ‘A la Descente des Tuileries’ and renamed it ‘A la Petite Boule Blanche’. Two years later Moreau was received as a maître-ébéniste. Throughout his career he enjoyed a thriving business, producing and retailing furniture in the late Louis XV, Transition and Louis XVI styles. He supplied a number of the aristocracy with fine pieces of furniture and also supplied the Court through the intermediary of the Menus-Plaisirs. Like Genty, Moreau made many of his own pieces but also retailed works by other leading Parisian makers, notably Bircklé, Foullet, Topino and Boudin. The latter supplied him with a number of pieces with floral marquetry and chinoiserie lacquer.
Due to the number of different, albeit fine suppliers, it is not surprising that works by Moreau exhibit an eclectic and varied style. We know however that he certainly made a number of pieces in his own workshop. These included various tables, secrétaires, bureaux à cylindre, armoires, commodes and anything concerning the Parisian ébénisterie and menuiserie trade.
Moreau’s workshop also produced a variety of pieces including beautiful Louis XV commodes, consoles, sideboards and writing desks. Some pieces were ornamented with a variety of marquetry motifs, as here with flowers and foliage as well as trophies and geometric patterns, while other pieces were decorated with Oriental lacquers. In contrast, his later Louis XVI pieces generally had very little marquetry decoration but featured strong and vigorous lines, decorated with a rich mahogany veneer, heightened by bold yet restrained gilt bronze mounts. From about 1778, Moreau and fellow ébénistes such as Garnier and Cosson produced a number of highly fashionable chairs made from mahogany, (though chair production at this time was still restricted to the menuisiers, mahogany chairs were in fact made by the ébénistes).
After Moreau’s death his workshop was continued by his widow and subsequently his son, who worked from rue Saint-Honoré near to the Place Vendôme where he remained up until the end of the Empire. Work by Louis Moreau can be seen in the Kress Collection at the Metropolitan Museum, New York which has a beautiful Transition commode by him decorated with geometric marquetry motifs.
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