A Russian mother-of-pearl inlaid and tulipwood marquetry kidney-shaped centre table, late 18th century

Pavlosk Palace, Saint Petersburg, Russia (the printed label correspond to the palace's inventory undertaken circa 1840-1850);

Sold lot 109, in these Rooms, 3rd December 1997

The late-eighteenth century was a productive time for cabinetmaking in Russia. This fruitfulness stems from Catherine the Great’s decision to re-furnish the imperial palaces in the early 1770s, having lamented that the Court lack furniture to such an extent that they were forced transport the same pieces ‘with us to the Summer Palace, from there to Peterhof, and [then]… back to Moscow.’¹ While there was clear inspiration taken from the work of cabinetmakers in France and England, as well as the import of Western European furniture to the Imperial and noble palaces of Russia – most notably that of David Roentgen – the there was also a distinct Russian style that developed between 1780 and 1840.

Kidney-shaped tables were relatively common furniture type in this period. Moreover, the collection at Pavlovsk Palace – where this table once was –  was considered one of the finest collections of Russian furniture at the end of the eighteenth century thanks to the avid collecting of Paul I and his wife Maria Feodorovna.^[2] These tables were typically decorated in floral or classicised marquetry forms, such as the urn on the tabletop this lot. Marquetry furniture in Russia in this period was typically highly detailed. Like their European counterparts, Russian cabinetmakers did sometimes use expensive, imported woods but the Empire’s vastness meant that they had access to a profusion of indigenous woods with which to make their designs.³ The addition of mother-of-pearl inlay, as in this particular model, is a rare addition to a kidney table of this period.  

A comparable model – though with a stretcher and a floral central marquetry design – was sold at Sotheby’s New York, 26^th November 1976, lot 175.

¹ Antoine Chenevière, Russian Furniture: The Golden Age 1780-1840. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988, 13.

² Alexandra Vassilievna Alexeieva, Pavlovsk: The Collections. Paris, Alain de Gourcouff Editeur, 1993, 98.

³ Chenevière, Russian Furniture, 38.