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Mirror case (valve de miroir) (Front)

Mirror case (valve de miroir) (Front)
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Front

Front

Front

Subject
Secular. Courtly love. Hunting scene.

Repository Institution
www.harvardartmuseums.org

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Cambridge (Mass.), Harvard University, Harvard Art Museum

1952.95

Ivory

Height: 127mm (diameter)
Depth: 16mm

King and queen on horseback; king chucking his lover under the chin; hunters on horseback holding lures for hawks; attendant on foot holding a pair of gloves.
Corner terminals: four crouching monsters.

London 1923: French, 1st half of 14th century.
Randall 1993: French (?) or English (?), 2nd quarter of the 14th century.
Museum online catalogue 2009: French (Paris), c. 1300-1350.


Attribution
Unknown

Reverse
Various labels with inscriptions: '174', '5', 'H. Oppenhei[mer]', 'J-190 [C]ARVE[D I]VORY MI[R]ROR [CAS]E'.

Object Condition
Missing: face of the attendant, piece of the background next to the queen's head including the lure held by the first horseman (replaced with a diamond-shaped piece; the lure has been replaced by a mace).

Comments
The companion piece to this mirror may be Koechlin 1054, now in a private collection in London.

Provenance
Collection of John Watkins Brett (b. 1805, d. 1863), Burleigh House, London: his sale, Christie, Manson and Woods, London, 18 April 1864, lot 2003; Rhodes collection. Collection of Jeffery Whitehead: sale, Sotheby's, London, 14 March 1906, lot 10. Collection of Henry Oppenheimer, London (exhibited in 1923 at the Burlington Club): his sale, Christie's, London, 15 July 1936, lot 174. Collection of William Randolph Hearst, New York: sold to Blumka Gallery through J. F. Hayward, England; sold by Blumka to the Harvard Art Museum in 1952.

Bibliography
Catalogue of an Exhibition of Carvings in Ivory, exhibition catalogue, London, Burlington Fine Arts Club, 1923, no. 143, pl. XL.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, p. 377, n. 1.
Exhibition of French Art 1200-1900, exhibition catalogue, London, Academy of Arts, 1932, no. 580r.
H. Bober, 'A French Gothic Mirror Case', in Fogg Art Museum Annual Report (1952-1953), p. 5.
Transformations of the Court Style: Gothic art in Europe, 1270 to 1330, ed. by D. Gillerman, exhibition catalogue, Providence, Rhode Island School of Design, 1977, no. 19 (ill. on p. 63 and cover)
R. H. Randall, The Golden Age of Ivory: Gothic Ivory Carvings in North American Collections (New York, 1993), no. 185 (ill. on p. 124).
M.-A. Carlier, Art Médiéval: Exposition à l'occasion du centenaire de Brimo de Laroussilhe, (Paris, 2008), pp. 80-85 (ill. on p. 84)


Image

Conway Library © Courtauld Institute of Art.
Credit line: Harvard Art Museum, Fogg Art Museum, Gifts for Special Uses Fund, 1952.95.

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