2-737-156 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Pair of Candle Stands (torchères), c. 1773. Inspired by discoveries of ancient ruins at Herculaneum and Pompeii in the 1730s, fashionable aristocratic architecture and interiors reflected a taste for neoclassical decoration. Thomas Chippendale, the most recognizable, influential London cabinetmaker of this era made these candle stands as part of a larger suite of four for the grand drawing room of Brocket Hall, the country seat of Sir Peniston Lamb, a recently knighted English lord. Their design is modeled on an ancient Roman marble candlestick decorated with carved acanthus leaves, swags, fluting, ram’s head supports, and oval masks depicting the Roman goddess Diana. Chippendale’s masterful understanding of neoclassical proportion, scale, and ornament is also reflected in the candle stands’ monumental size, designed specifically for the grand proportions of a country house interior. When they were on display at Brocket Hall they were first placed on either side of a large mirror, then eventually flanked a large portrait of the king, George IV.