Lot n° 165
Estimation :
600 - 800
EUR
The Company of Marbles and Onyx of Algeria - Lot 165
The Company of Marbles and Onyx of Algeria
Clock in gilt bronze, enamels champelvés polychromes and onyx of Algeria of period Napoleon III
Paris. Napoleon III period
Dimensions : 42 x 18 x 18 cm
(The Roman numerals of the dial are later).
Founded by Alphonse Pallu, the Société des marbres et onyx d'Algérie acquired the rights to exploit the quarries in the province of Oran in 1858, and in 1861 set up its own art foundry. Algerian onyx has been known and used since antiquity, and was rediscovered around 1848 by Jean Baptiste Del Monte, a marble worker from Carrara, during archaeological excavations. Shortly after its acquisition by Pallu in 1858, a factory was set up in Paris. In 1863, the Company opened a store at 24 Boulevard des Italiens, where a "permanent exhibition" allowed visitors to discover columns, sheaths, fireplaces, jardinières, bowls, vases, clocks, candelabras, etc.
The place quickly became a great success and received enthusiastic appreciations: "We went to visit the stores that the Pallu & Cie Company opened on the Boulevard des Italiens, and we do not exaggerate when we say that we were literally amazed by what we saw there. It is not possible to describe in a few lines these thousand objects taken from onyx and which, to the richness of the material, join the finish of the most perfect art; but we saw columns and torchères that no palace in the world has because these pieces are unique. When you are at MM. Pallu's, you feel like you are in an enchanted palace; gold, enamel and onyx are combined with such good taste and science that you don't know which of these three materials best brings out the others. "Le Monde illustré, n°349, December 19, 1863.
The Compagnie des Marbres et Onyx d'Algérie collaborated with Charles Cordier but also supplied other artists such as Carrier-Belleuse and Louis-Ernest Barrias for numerous decorative pieces, such as a monumental ornament that he presented at the Exposition Universelle in 1867.
Expert : Stéphane Pepe
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