Mirrors
Live de Miroirs, Tables et Guéridons, c. 1670, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Accession No. 33.84.1-4)
Standish Robert Gage Prendergast Vereker, Bassano Ltd., whole-plate glass negative, 30 April 1921 (NPG x120960)
Hamsterley Hall, the huge baroque shell canopy over the front door with view southwards, including the pinnacle removed from the original Houses of Pariament and the roof balustrade from Beaudesert marking the garden perimeter
THE HAMSTERLEY HALL SILVERED MIRROR
W: 43.5” 110cm
Further images
Provenance
Standish Robert Gage Prendergast Vereker, 7th Viscount Gort, MC, KStJ (1888-1975), Hamsterley Hall, County Durham, England
By descent to Hon. Catherine Mary Wass, OBE (1942-2021)
Private Collection: California, USA
Literature
Bowett, A., English Furniture: 1660-1714 (Woodbridge: 2002), pp. 12-5, 126-7, 139-43
Colville, J. R., Man of Valour: The Life of Field-Marshal the Viscount Gort (London, 1972)
Thornton, P., Seventeenth-Century Interior Decoration in England, France and Holland (New Haven and London, 1978), pp. 232-3, pl. 218
C. Hussey, ‘Hamsterley Hall, Durham: The Seat of the Hon. S. R. Vereker, M. C.’, Country Life, 21st October 1939, pp. 418-22
Example in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (Accession No. W.37-1949)
Example exhibited at The Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair, 1996 (Catalogue, p. 106)
Silver metal examples at Knole, Kent (NT 130034 and NT 130014.1/NT 130014.2, including silver metal furniture NT 130035 and NT 130036.1/NT 130036.2)
Silver metal examples in the Royal Collection (RCIN 35300, RCIN 35392 and RCIN 35302, including silver metal furniture RCIN 35299 and RCIN 35298)
Child, Graham, World Mirrors 1650-1900 (London, 1990), pp. 62-3
Hinkley, F. Lewis, Queen Anne & Georgian Looking Glasses (London, 1987), p. 87, pl. 61
Schiffer, Herbert F., The Mirror Book (New York, 1983), pp. 36-42
Wills, Geoffrey, English Looking Glasses (1670-1820) (London, 1965), p. 65, fig. 1; p. 67, figs. 7-8
THE HAMSTERLEY HALL MIRROR
An English silvered giltwood Baroque mirror
English, circa 1670
A large carved wood mirror with a silvered and gilt surface, the frame decorated with fruiting vines, foliage, flowers and putti. The cresting is centred by a standing putto beneath a basket of flowers, flanked by reclining figures, with further putti incorporated into the spandrels and lower frame.
The scale, high-relief carving and use of a silvered surface place the mirror within a small group of English Baroque mirrors dating from the Restoration period. Related examples are in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Liverpool.
The decoration reflects the influence of French Baroque ornament on English design during the reign of Charles II. The silvered surface, intended to imitate silver furniture, also relates to silvered furnishings made for English interiors during the later seventeenth century.
The mirror was formerly in the collection of Standish Robert Gage Prendergast Vereker, 7th Viscount Gort, at Hamsterley Hall, County Durham. Gort assembled a collection of seventeenth and eighteenth-century furniture and works of art at the house, which incorporated earlier architectural elements and interiors.
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