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238
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ROYAL PALACE OF MILAN, FLATS OF NAPOLEON KING OF ITALY
A pai…
See original version (French)
238
-
ROYAL PALACE OF MILAN, FLATS OF NAPOLEON KING OF ITALY
A pai…
See original version (French)
Estimate €2,000 - €3,000
Voluntary lot
Description
ROYAL PALACE OF MILAN, FLATS OF NAPOLEON KING OF ITALY
A pair of upholstered CHAIRS with green relacquered walnut frames with gold piping. The back is a basket-handle design, decorated with a frieze of frets and a string of pearls. The trapezoid seat is decorated with oblong frets, ribbons and pearls; it is supported by a turned, tapered, ringed, fluted and filleted base finished with foliate hooves. Small brackets join the rings on the legs. The frames are upholstered with damaged tapestries (later fixing screws).
Label of the Palazzo Reale in Milan under number 72. "Sala del lever" in ink. Each has a number stamped on it; 30 and 32 on different parts of the chairs. For chair 30, the MR mark is stamped on the back crossbar to indicate 'Maison Reale'.
Italian work from the 18th century.
Height: 100 cm. Depth : 51 cm. Width: 55 cm.
Provenance : Ile de France castle.
Apart from a pair of consoles, most of the furniture has disappeared.
For the royal palace in Milan, the architect Giocondo Albertolli (1742-1839) designed furniture for the court of Archduke Ferdinand to complement the vault decorations created from 1774 onwards in the 'nouvelle manière' or 'Greek taste' according to the as yet vague and undefined definition of the time for us today simply called neo-classical.
Judging by the drawings, the furniture fitted in perfectly with the ornamental taste of the rooms in Milan's royal palace, as can be seen from the inventory drawn up in 1788. It is characterised by finely carved ornaments, gilded with chips' on white backgrounds or with soft green and light blue polychromes, the decoration of the chairs we are showing (visible under the second layer of paint).
Nothing has survived since the dispersal of 1796, when French troops looted part of the palace before holding an auction. Some of the furniture remained in place because it was of little interest during the Napoleonic period between 1803 and 1805, and was considered obsolete.
Apart from a pair of painted and gilded wooden consoles on top of white Carrara marble, most of the furniture has disappeared. These pieces still bear witness to the pictorial ornamentation used on some of the furniture.
The decoration, known as "fine lacquer" or "biacche", i.e. simple tempera, was applied to a thin plaster base protected by a veil of transparent varnish, just as it was used in Lombardy at the end of the 18th century. A very fine pictorial finish that was sometimes repeated when furniture was being maintained.
Talking of inventories, the furniture bears numerous marks, in addition to the numbering or labels mentioning the pieces marked in ink and pen, the MR (Mobilier royal) hot-iron mark defined the link with prestigious production. The chairs shown here come from the "sala del lever", under number 72. As Sandrino Schiffini, current director of the museum, suggests, the name of this room derives from the rite of rising, i.e. the morning reception, a room near the Emperor's private flat.
Our chairs, which certainly feature in the 1814 inventory kept in the Milan city archives, are an extraordinary relic of the palace that welcomed the Emperor after his coronation as King of Italy on 26 May 1805 in the Duomo of Milan.
See original version (French)
Auto-translation. Refer to original language for legal validity.
Lot description modified on 06/05/2026 at 12:13 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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