A Cologne cabinet
from the workshop of Melchior von Rheidt
Ebony, maple, pear and stained and branded fruitwood and softwood veneers on softwood and oak, wrought iron locks. Two-part cabinet with two-doored lower section and two-doored upper section. The pediment supported by two three-dimensional carved female caryatids. The front legs each with a mascaron. All framing elements richly inlaid with bird, flower, and foliage motifs as well as strapwork on ebonised wood ground. The doors inlaid with large flower vases. The upper doors with birds in trompe l'oiel frames. The centre with two drawers flanked by female mascarons, the front of the base with three corresponding male mascarons. All four outer faces inlaid with strapwork in moulded surrounds. The hand of one caryatid lost, minor losses to the inlays, minor shrinkage cracks, traces of earlier insect damage. H 171, W 130, D 69 cm.
Around 1600 - 1610.
Very similar arabesques and strapwork ornaments can be found on the two cabinets in the Museum für Angewandte Kunst in Cologne and on a chest in the Kölnisches Stadtmuseum. The ornaments can be traced back to the Cologne engraver Jakob Guckeisen and the Strasbourg engraver Johann Jakob Ebelmann, who published their "Schweyfbuch" in Cologne in 1599.
Petra Werhahn-Fleischhauer assumes that a transition from inlaid to carved cabinets took place in the workshop of Melchior von Rheidt and his successor Hans von Rheidt after 1610. The earliest known furniture from the workshop uses inlaid pillars instead of figural caryatids and diamond bosses instead of mascarons, for example. The piece presented here is a typical example of this transitional period. All visible surfaces are filled with different ornaments, which are masterly executed in terms of craftsmanship and reference an extensive repertoire of motifs. It would have been impossible to create denser or finer marquetry. The further development of the object consists exclusively in the addition of sculptural elements.
Provenance
Private collection, Lower Rhine Region.
Literature
For this type cf. Colsman, Möbel, Gotik bis Jugendstil, Cologne 1999, cat. no. 90 ff.
Cf. Werhahn-Fleischhauer, Melchior von Rheidt und die Frage der Kölner Intarsienmöbel, in: Der Riss im Himmel, Band I, Cologne 1999, p. 255 ff.