{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O370292"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O370292/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2009CR2691/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2009CR2691/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"high","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2009CR2691","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2009CR2729","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2009CR2690","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2009CR2684","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2009CR2683","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2009CR2682","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":{"_iiif_pres":"https://iiif.vam.ac.uk/collections/O370292/manifest.json","_alt_iiif_pres":[]}},"record":{"systemNumber":"O370292","accessionNumber":"4904-1858","objectType":"Torchere","titles":[],"summaryDescription":"","physicalDescription":"One of a pair of gilt-wood torchères, carved all over with acanthus foliage, bellflower drops and other ornament, partly symbolising Venus (her mask with scallop shell) and Apollo (the sunflower). It has a circular top shelf supported on a turned, tapered urn, which surmounts a long pierced shaft comprising three square-section uprights out-scrolled at the top, where they alternate with - and frame - three female masks, each crowned with a scallop shell. The shaft is supported on a further turned baluster, which in turn rests on the spreading base, comprising three scrolled square-section legs, each formed as a C-scroll over a spiral scroll on a moulded square plinth foot. The feet and most of the bottom baluster are later additions, while the top shelf is a replacement. 4905-1858 was regilded in the 1960s, whereas the gilding on 4904-1858 dates from before 1858 (and is probably contemporary with the additions). \r\n\r\nMost of the frame is carved with acanthus leaves - spreading on the underside of the top; rising on the top urn; falling on the pierced scrolls (with a spine of husks), and beneath the Venus masks (here worn like a ruff under the hair); rising at the bottom of the shaft; falling on the three sections of the baluster below (interspersed with flowers in the top section, which is fluted underneath); rising again on each scrolled leg - at the top of the C-scroll and around the large spiral scroll, which centres in a sunflower-head on each side. Further acanthus is carved in between the C-scrolls, above a single acanthus seed-pod pendant terminal (the seeds visible only from a worm's-eye view). Each C-scroll is carved with pendant bellflowers, which also appear on the uprights of the shaft above, in low relief, and more robustly in between the uprights, in the round. The bellflower drops on the shaft are interrupted by a wide moulded strap tying the uprights together, and shaped in between the uprights to accommodate three sunflower-heads. Several other mouldings articulate the different sections of each torchère: egg-and-acanthus around the edge of the top shelf; squared beads at the top of the urn; three convex (torus and quarter-round) mouldings at the top, middle and bottom of the baluster; and a stepped cavetto moulding at the top of each square foot, which ends in a large acanthus-carved quarter-round moulding.\r\n\r\nThis torchère is made mainly of oak, but partly of other woods, which are clearly later repairs or interventions. The replaced round top shelf appears, surprisingly, to be in two sections - softwood (probably pine) on top, including the egg-and-acanthus moulding, and lime(?) underneath the moulding, presumably including the acanthus scrolls on the underside. Most of the baluster below the shaft is also in lime(?) - that is, the two larger, acanthus-carved sections below the top convex moulding and above the low, acanthus-carved, ogee-shaped section. The plinth feet are also made of lime(?), two of them being further built up at the bottom in softwood. \r\n\r\nThe vertically-grained oak core is pieced out in several places - for instance in segments at the top of the top urn, in the pierced scrolls flanking the Venus masks, and probably also at the bottom of the baluster below, i.e. wherever it extends beyond the three uprights in the shaft; whereas the lime(?) section of the baluster, which is horizontally grained, is not pieced out. Level with the moulded strap that ties the uprights together the core remains solid (i.e. literally uniting them), except for a hole pierced through the centre (2.4 cm in diameter). At top and bottom of these square-section uprights there is evidence for similar holes in the core - the top one attested by a modern filler, the bottom one begun but not fully cut out. Possibly therefore these holes were made when the lime(?) baluster was inserted, with a view to holding the parts together with a rod; if so, this obtrusive device was not completed, and the baluster must in fact be secured by loose tenons or loose dowels. At the bottom of the stem the quarter-round moulding is also horizontally grained, so this is probably made in one piece with the top, solid section of the tripod base. Each scrolled leg below appears to comprise a diagonally-grained length of wood in the middle of the C-scroll, half-lapped and probably tenoned to this solid section. The diagonal length is presumably also tenoned to the large spiral-scroll below, and to a short, almost vertically-grained section forming the bottom of the C-scroll, which must likewise be tenoned to the spiral-scroll. The spiral scroll is pieced together in three-five laminations, grained not quite vertically; and each sunflower-head is separately applied (in the opposite plane to the laminations). The plinth foot, in lime(?), at the bottom of each leg is grained vertically, so presumably tenoned up into the scroll. Some of the joints in the tripod base can also be discerned in 4905-1858, but whether this parallels 4904-1858 in the use of oak, lime(?) and softwood cannot be seen.\r\n\r\nThe round top shelf has a hole in the centre (1.2 cm in diameter), extending c. 12 cm down into the stem, where the two elements may once have been secured by a loose dowel (these holes apparently unrelated to those of larger diameter lower down the stem, discussed above). Now the shelf is instead screwed down to the stem (with two screws). \r\n\r\nOne of the husk drops in the shaft (between the uprights) is missing, and two of the legs have been repaired with a screw driven up through the C-scroll into the solid section above. The baluster above the tripod, as well as being a later element in itself (in lime(?) and horizontally grained), incorporates a conspicuous horizontal joint near the bottom of the fluting, and its carving differs in detail from the equivalent area on 4905-1858. It may be that, on 4904-1858, this altered or added section has itself been subject to further repair. Alternatively this joint may simply be where the new lime block was pieced out, and subsequently re-glued, rather clumsily.\r\n\r\nIn 1984, a conservator 'tested the gilding round a collar near the top …, and reported that there were two layers of water gilding with an oil based 'antiquing' varnish applied over the top. He also tested a section of the tripod stand and reported that this had one layer of oil gilding.' The 'collar' that was tested (the moulding dividing the two sections of the top urn) does indeed show two very clear layers of gilding, the upper layer on a thick new application of gesso, but elsewhere on the stem only one gilding layer can be seen; conversely, on the scroll legs there are clearly two layers of gesso in places (visible in cross-section where one pieced-out section has come apart), and in places two layers of burnished leaf are visible. So it seems likely that the stem and the legs share the same history of decoration, that is, that the top gilding layer was applied over a partly delaminated gilt surface below - probably at the same time as the new parts of the stem, and the feet, were inserted. The 'antiquing varnish' appears also to be brushed over the label on this torchère, which probably dates from shortly before the Museum acquired the pair (see below), so this varnish is likely to have been applied in the Museum. Despite its two layers of gilding, and this varnish, the carved detail on this torchère is a great deal sharper than on 4905-1858, which was regilded extremely coarsely in the 1960s.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Unknown","id":"A1848"},"association":{"text":"","id":""},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"Oak","id":"AAT12264"}],"techniques":[{"text":"Carving","id":"AAT53149"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Carved and gilt oak, with additions and repairs in lime and softwood","categories":[{"text":"Woodwork","id":"THES48877"},{"text":"Furniture","id":"THES48948"}],"styles":[{"text":"Baroque","id":"AAT21147"}],"collectionCode":{"text":"FWK","id":"THES48597"},"images":["2009CR2691","2009CR2729","2009CR2690","2009CR2684","2009CR2683","2009CR2682"],"imageResolution":"high","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"001A","id":"THES389618"},"free":"","case":"","shelf":"","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"Torchere","id":""}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"France","id":"x28849"},"association":{"text":"Made","id":"x28654"},"note":"probably"}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"ca. 1700--30","earliest":"1695-01-01","latest":"1730-12-31"},"association":{"text":"Made","id":"x28654"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[],"creditLine":"","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"161.8","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"46.7","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"through centre of legs, from leg 1","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"45.9","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"through centre of  legs, from leg 2","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"44.5","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"through centre of legs, from leg 3","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"50.8","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"across scrolls at feet (a)","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"54","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"across scrolls at feet (b)","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"51","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"across scrolls at feet (c)","note":""},{"dimension":"Diameter","value":"38.5","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"of circular top","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"Measurements taken July 2009","marksAndInscriptions":[{"content":"TORC[HE]RE or GUERIDON …\r\n…ed of three scroll-sh…\r\n… period of Louis XI[V]\r\nPrice, wit[h]…","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"Printed, on a torn label on a moulding at the top of the tripod base, over the gilding but under a varnish (probably the same varnish as applied to the gilt surface)"}],"objectHistory":"","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Carved and gilt torchere (candle-stand), French, ca. 1700--30(?)","bibliographicReferences":[],"production":"This replicates (apart from some later additions) a model produced in ormolu, and was probably copied from the ormolu version. It seems likely to date from before the 19th century, since it underwent some major alterations prior to 1858 when it entered the Museum's collection. If 18th-century, then it is perhaps likely to have been made before it was stylistically wholly outdated, so the date span 1700--30 seems most plausible.","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["4904-1858"],"accessionNumberNum":"4904","accessionNumberPrefix":"","accessionYear":1858,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2025-08-14","recordCreationDate":"2009-06-24","availableToBook":true}}