Armand Albert Rateau. Bronze Hand Mirror

ARMAND ALBERT RATEAU (1882-1938) Ovoid bronze hand-front with brown and antique green patina presenting a beveled mirror with a medallion depicting two birds and on the back a chiseled decoration of a man with his animals sitting in a plant landscape. Around 1920. Width: 26 cm. Bibliography: Franck Olivier and François Rateau from 1992, a baroque at the modern editions of the Amateur in 1992 (medallion with birds p.168-173). Armand-Albert Rateau decorator, architect and also goldsmith, did among other things the decoration of the private apartment of Jeanne Lanvin, around 1920. Very wealthy collectors, businessmen or aristocrats, Rateau's clients are part of the European and American Gotha. Against the trends of the time, his bronze furniture seduces the most refined aesthetes. It was his taste for Antiquity that gave him the idea of using metal for certain seats with X-shaped legs, and the Orient led him to make extensive use of lacquers, gold or silver lacquer, yellow or brown lacquer.