Joseph Cremer French, 1811-1878 A Louis XIV style gilt bronze-mounted ebony, ebonised and brass inlaid Boulle style marquetry grand cabinet Paris, third quarter 19th century

surmounted by a brèche de Campan rubané marble top, the doors opening to reveal six short drawers below a cupboard with an adjustable shelf, the carcass stamped twice CREMER / MARQUETEUR

Denise Ledoux-Lebard, Le Mobilier Français du XIX Siècle, Paris, 1984, pp. 135-138

Christopher Payne, European Furniture of the 19th century, Woodbridge, 2013, p. 37

Jonathan Meyer, Great Exhibitions - London, New York, Paris, Philadelphia 1851 - 1900, Woodbridge, 2006, pp. 101, 126, 147

Joseph Cremer (1811-1878) was born to Flemish parents in 1811. He was active from 1839 to 1878 in Paris and was one of the most celebrated marqueteurs of the mid-Nineteenth Century. Cremer was ranked amongst the top furniture manufacturers working in Paris and supplied furniture to king Louis-Philippe of France and the King of Holland. Some of the finest examples of his work are included in the permanent collection of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. He also worked in conjunction with André Lemoine who had a Royal Warrant from Napoléon III. He was a member of the Académie de l'Industrie and made his own original designs.

Cremer participated in numerous Paris exhibitions and received several awards, including the following Exposition Universelle prizes; 1839 a médaille d'honneur; 1844 a médaille de bronze; 1849 a médaille d'argent. Cremer also exhibited at the 1855 French Exposition Universelle where it was recorded that his submission was:

'Un meuble de salon en noyer et ébène, les battants de l'armoire couverts de branchages fruits et fleurs, groupés et mouvements, les panneaux du bas ornés de deux têtes de chiens et de chèvres surtout de leur niche, et des meubles de Boulle, avec marqueterie obtenue par galvanoplastie. Il avait également exécuté la marqueterie d'un meuble exposé par Tahan. D'après le rapport du jury, comme ton, comme dessin, il est impossible d'atteindre dans un travail de marqueterie à plus d'harmonie et de justesse M. Cremer est un maître' [Cat. Exp. univ., 1855. - Rapport by H. Marie Martin.]

He also exhibited at the London Exhibitions of 1851 and 1862, where in 1851 he received a second class medal. In 1862 he exhibited a side cabinet, after the model by Reisener in the Royal Collection, employing a new process for the execution of 'Buhl inlays,' using permanent dyes as introduced by M. Bouverie in 1855. The piece was greeted with considerable contemporary acclaim.

His specialty was various types of marquetry and, in particular Boulle work as in the present cabinet, to the extent that he sent made-up panels for other makers. As well as designing pieces in a modern idiom, his repertoire also included close reproductions of Louis XIV designs. Recent research in New York suggests that Cremer was almost certainly supplying marquetry to the New York makers, notably Gustav Herter, for incorporation into their own pieces.