JACQUES CHARLIER

(1720-1790)

Love and Friendship

Around 1780

Watercolor and gouache, round, 6 cm.

Double-sided snuffbox in tortoiseshell and gilded bronze, 6.8 x 2.5cm.

Exceptional double-sided snuffbox including on its lid and under its base, two allegories of Love and Friendship.

Altar of Friendship:

A young woman draped in antique style places a wreath of flowers on an altar on which rests a flaming heart.

Altar of Love:

A young woman identifiable as Vesta revives the sacred fire. This priestess personifies the offering to love. The Vestals were devoted to chastity and responsible for maintaining the sacred fire.

Behind her, a young girl with two doves, her iconography is that of innocence in the face of love, personified by the doves, testifying to a certain hidden eroticism.

Jacques Charlier (1720-1790) was a miniature painter to Louis XV from 1753 and one of the best miniaturists of his time. In this capacity, he received orders from Louis XV and Madame de Pompadour and was also the protégé of Caylus and the Prince de Conti. A student of François Boucher, he was not an academician and rarely signed his works. He created numerous miniatures on ivory based on the works of his master as well as pastels. These are mainly mythological scenes, gallant or erotic scenes as well as portraits.

Excellent state of conservation.

Price: 2500

RELATED WORKS:

CHARLIER Jacques (around 1720-1790), The Altar of Friendship, Louvre, Inventory number RF 4271, vol.20, p.199.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

L. Schidlof, Bénézit, Bouchard, Lespinasse, Foster, Thieme and Becker, Lemberger, Mireur, Bouchot, Darmon, Mauri, Sanchez..

MUSEUMS:

Louvre, Paris; Stockholm National Museum, coll. Tansey, Celle; Wallace coll;