Pair Of Large Cassolettes Signed "e.mottheau Paris" Late 19th Century

Pair of large Athenian-shaped perfume burner cassolettes in white Carrara marble and gilded bronze in Louis XVI style signed *E.Mottheau Paris late 19th century. The lid is decorated with a delicately carved acanthus leaf and topped with a gilded bronze pine cone. The ovoid-shaped vase decorated with a pine cone at its base is surrounded by a frieze of foliage scrolls decorated with floral crowns in the center and enhanced with a finely chiseled openwork gadroon frieze. The vase is suspended by three gilded bronze feet chiseled with interlacing, topped with rams' heads ending in hooves. They rest on a tripod base in white Carrara marble decorated with a frieze of flowering branches and rosettes presenting a mascaron of a stylized flower in gilded bronze in the center. The two bases are signed E.Mottheau Paris. Original mercury gilding with double patina in very good condition. (cleaned by our workshop) Quality Parisian work both in the carving of the bronzes and the gilding as well as in the accuracy of the proportions. *Ernest Louis Mottheau 1841-1905 At 12 years old, Ernest Mottheau was an apprentice engraver. He became a worker in 1857 then founded his own house in 1864, first located on rue Saint-Sébastien (Paris, 11th arr.) then rue du Perche, in the Marais district of Paris (3rd arr.). In January 1867 in Paris (3rd arr.), Ernest Mottheau married Élise Claudine Carcanagues, daughter of a jeweler. The Mottheau bronze factory produces chandeliers and candelabra in particular. It participated, as part of groups of craftsmen, in the Universal Exhibitions of Paris in 1867 and 1878. During the international exhibitions of Paris in 1886, the Mottheau house obtained a silver medal then in 1887 a gold medal. She received the same award during the Universal Exhibition of 1889. The Mottheau workshop moved around 1899 rue des Tournelles in Paris (3rd arr.) and took the name “Mottheau et fils”, Eugène having joined forces with his father in 1897. The 1900 Universal Exhibition in Paris brought recognition to his house. Ernest Mottheau appears in the admission and installation lists and receives a grand prize for the presentation of a light column entitled La Nature, by the sculptor Eugène Piat.