|
Gilt Bronze
Ormolu (; ) is the gilding technique of applying finely ground, high-carat gold– mercury amalgam to an object of bronze, and objects finished in this way. The mercury is driven off in a kiln, leaving behind a gold coating. The French refer to this technique as '';'' in English, it is known as ''gilt bronze.'' Around 1830, legislation in France outlawed the use of mercury for health reasons, though use continued to the 1900s. Process The manufacture of true ormolu employs a process known as mercury-gilding or fire-gilding, in which a solution of mercuric nitrate is applied to a piece of copper, brass, or bronze; followed by the application of an amalgam of gold and mercury. The item is then exposed to extreme heat until the mercury vaporizes and the gold remains, adhering to the metal object. This process has generally been supplanted by the electroplating of gold over a nickel substrate, which is more economical and less dangerous. Health risk In literature there is a 1612 r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clock Julien Beliard
A clock or chronometer is a device that measures and displays time. The clock is one of the oldest Invention, human inventions, meeting the need to measure intervals of time shorter than the natural units such as the day, the lunar month, and the year. Devices operating on several physical processes have been used over the Millennium, millennia. Some predecessors to the modern clock may be considered "clocks" that are based on movement in nature: A sundial shows the time by displaying the position of a shadow on a flat surface. There is a range of duration timers, a well-known example being the hourglass. Water clocks, along with sundials, are possibly the oldest time-measuring instruments. A major advance occurred with the invention of the verge escapement, which made possible the first mechanical clocks around 1300 in Europe, which kept time with oscillating timekeepers like balance wheels., pp. 103–104., p. 31. Traditionally, in horology (the study of timekeeping), the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Repoussé And Chasing
''Repoussé'' () or ''repoussage'' () is a metalworking technique in which a malleable metal is shaped by hammering from the reverse side to create a design in low relief. Chasing (French: '' ciselure'') or embossing is a similar technique in which the piece is hammered on the front side, sinking the metal. The two techniques are often used in conjunction. Many metals can be used for chasing and repoussé work, including gold, silver, copper, and alloys such as steel, bronze, and pewter. These techniques are very ancient and have been extensively used all over the world, as they require only the simplest tools and materials, and yet allow great diversity of expression. They are also relatively economical, since there is no loss or waste of metal, which mostly retains its original size and thickness. Toolmarks are often intentionally left visible in the result. A few among many famous examples of repoussé and chasing are the prehistoric Gundestrup cauldron, the mask on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lost Wax Casting
Lost-wax castingalso called investment casting, precision casting, or ''cire perdue'' (; loanword, borrowed from French language, French)is the process by which a duplicate sculpture (often a metal, such as silver, gold, brass, or bronze) is casting, cast from an original sculpture. Intricate works can be achieved by this method. The oldest known examples of this technique are approximately 6,500 years old (4550–4450 BC) and attributed to gold artefacts found at Bulgaria's Varna Necropolis. A copper amulet from Mehrgarh, Indus Valley civilization, in present-day Pakistan, is dated to circa 4,000 BC. Cast copper objects, found in the Nahal Mishmar hoard in southern Israel, which belong to the Chalcolithic period (4500–3500 BC), are estimated, from carbon-14 dating, to date to circa 3500 BC. Other examples from somewhat later periods are from Mesopotamia in the third millennium BC. Lost-wax casting was widespread in Europe until the 18th century, when a piece-moulding process c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Cressent
Charles Cressent (1685–1768) was a French furniture-maker, sculptor and fondeur-ciseleur of the régence style. As the second son of François Cressent, sculpteur du roi, and grandson of Charles Cressent, a furniture-maker of Amiens, who also became a sculptor, he inherited tastes, skills and aptitudes which contributed to his success as an artist. Even more important, perhaps, was the fact that he was a pupil of André Charles Boulle. Cressent's distinction is closely connected with the regency, but his earlier work had affinities with the school of Boulle, while his later pieces were full of originality. As Geoffrey Bellaigue suggests, "Cressent was in his opinion and in that of his contemporaries more than just a skilled cabinet maker and sculptor...he was a collector of refined taste and a talented designer". Cressent was also a sculptor, and among his work is a bronze bust of Louis d'Orléans, Duke of Chartres, the son of Philippe d'Orléans, Duke of Orléans (later Reg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacques Caffieri
Jacques Caffieri (25 August 1678, Paris – 25 November 1755, Paris) was a French sculptor, working for the most part in bronze. Life Jacques Caffiéri was the fifth son of Philippe Caffieri (1634-1716), the founder of this family of artists. Jacques was received a ''maître fondeur-ciseleur'' by 1715, the date of his first known work, a design for a pall for the ''Corporation des Fondeurs-Ciseleurs'', one of two Parisian guilds that oversaw works cast in metal, from full-scale sculptures to gilt-bronze furniture mounts, wall-lights and candlesticks. As ''fondeur-ciseleur, fondeurs-ciseleurs'', "casters and finishers", the renown of the Caffieri family has centred on Jacques, though later it is not easy to distinguish between Jacques' work and that of Jacques' son, the younger Philippe (1714–1777). Caffieri was attached as ''fondeur-ciseleur'' to the Bâtiments du Roi in 1736. A large proportion of his brilliant achievement as a designer and chaser in bronze and other metal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ébéniste
An ''ébéniste'' () is a cabinet-maker, particularly one who works in ebony. The term is a loanword from French and translates to "ebonist". Etymology and ambiguities As opposed to ''ébéniste'', the term ''menuisier'' denotes a woodcarver or chairmaker in French. The English equivalent for ''ébéniste'', "ebonist", is not commonly used. Originally, an ''ébéniste'' was one who worked with ebony, a favoured luxury wood for mid-17th century Parisian cabinets, originating in imitation of elite furniture being made in Antwerp. The word is 17th-century in origin. Early Parisian ''ébénistes'' often came from the Low Countries themselves; an outstanding example is Pierre Gole, who worked at the '' Gobelins manufactory'' making cabinets and table tops veneered with marquetry, the traditional enrichment of ''ébénisterie'', or "cabinet-work". History ''Ébénistes'' make case furniture, either veneered or painted. Under Parisian guild regulations, painted varnishes, generica ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cabinet Making
A cabinet is a case or cupboard with shelves or drawers for storing or displaying items. Some cabinets are stand alone while others are built in to a wall or are attached to it like a medicine cabinet. Cabinets are typically made of wood (solid or with veneers or artificial surfaces), coated steel (common for medicine cabinets), or synthetic materials. Commercial grade cabinets usually have a melamine-particleboard substrate and are covered in a high-pressure decorative laminate commonly referred to as Wilsonart or Formica. Cabinets sometimes have one or more doors on the front, which are mounted with door hardware, and occasionally a lock. Cabinets may have one or more doors, drawers, or shelves. Short cabinets often have a finished surface on top that can be used for display, or as a working surface, such as the countertops found in kitchens. A cabinet intended to be used in a bedroom and with several drawers typically placed one above another in one or more columns int ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Metropolitan Museum Of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of largest art museums, largest art museum in the Americas. With 5.36 million visitors in 2023, it is the List of most-visited museums in the United States, most-visited museum in the United States and the List of most-visited art museums, fifth-most visited art museum in the world. In 2000, its permanent collection had over two million works; it currently lists a total of 1.5 million works. The collection is divided into 17 curatorial departments. The Met Fifth Avenue, The main building at 1000 Fifth Avenue, along the Museum Mile, New York, Museum Mile on the eastern edge of Central Park on Manhattan's Upper East Side, is by area one of the world's list of largest art museums, largest art museums. The first portion of the approximately building ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism, also spelled Neo-classicism, emerged as a Western cultural movement in the decorative arts, decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that drew inspiration from the art and culture of classical antiquity. Neoclassicism was born in Rome, largely due to the writings of Johann Joachim Winckelmann during the rediscovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Its popularity expanded throughout Europe as a generation of European art students finished their Grand Tour and returned from Italy to their home countries with newly rediscovered Greco-Roman ideals. The main Neoclassical movement coincided with the 18th-century Age of Enlightenment, and continued into the early 19th century, eventually competing with Romanticism. In architecture, the style endured throughout the 19th, 20th, and into the 21st century. European Neoclassicism in the visual arts began in opposition to the then-dominant Rococo style. Rococo architecture emphasizes grace, Ornament ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rococo
Rococo, less commonly Roccoco ( , ; or ), also known as Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and dramatic style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, and ''trompe-l'Å“il'' frescoes to create surprise and the illusion of motion and drama. It is often described as the final expression of the Baroque movement. The Rococo style began in France in the 1730s as a reaction against the more formal and geometric Louis XIV style. It was known as the "style Rocaille", or "Rocaille style". It soon spread to other parts of Europe, particularly northern Italy, Austria, southern Germany, Central Europe and Russia. It also came to influence other arts, particularly sculpture, furniture, silverware, glassware, painting, music, theatre, and literature. Although originally a secular style primarily used for interiors of private residences, the Rococo had a spiritual aspect to it which led to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
