20th Century, Italian Bronze Planter Or Gueridon

20thCentury, Italian Bronze Planter or Gueridon
Measures:cm W 56 x maximum diameter 51 x H 90. H on the floor of the wide 81 cm

This refined planter was made in Italy, in Naples, towards the fist 20th century, in the style of «Retour d'Egypte».It consists of a tripod structure in finelychiselled gilded bronze and lacquered in tones. Each leg originates with scrolldecorations and phytomorphic elements with golden details, supported by asphinx with hairstyle, tail and golden wings. This sits on a curvilinear andwavy element decorated with golden ramage and a man’s head with a long beard ofclassic taste. The legs end with an injured foot and rest on a tripartite basethat connects them. In the middle of each leg there is a bronze junction with curlsand volutes that converges towards the others in the center, where a verticalelement contributes to the momentum and gracefulness of the whole. The basin of the planter is in lacquered tin, withgold edges and reserves. The rising part of the tub has some holes that allowthe breathability of the space. This tripod is inspired, with variations, to afamous model of the brothers Luigi and Antonio Manfredini, active in Milan atthe beginning of the nineteenth century, financed by the viceroy of ItalyEugenio de Beauharnais, adopted son of Napoleon Bonaparte, for the opening ofthe real manufacture of Eugenia. The Retour d'Egypte style was widely echoed inFrance and Europe and originated from General Bonaparte’s military campaign inEgypt in 1799. The fashion of the Egyptians had already in Italy found aprevious interpreter in the engraver Giovan Battista Piranesi, but the vastdiffusion that also had in the furniture the Egyptian ornament finds the mainspringboard with the publication in 1802 of the volume of Dominique VivantDenon, the Egyptologist who followed the future emperor in the land of thepharaohs, diligently copying any archaeological vestiges that it was possiblefor them to fix on paper. The furnishings were decorated with sphinxes, palmettes,caryatids, Egyptian profiles, not infrequently in symbiosis with Greco-Romanelements.Veryrefined, elegant and with a marked decorative character, this tripod is easilyinserted in any furnishing context and in any environment. It can be thought ofin the center or near a corner, in an entrance or in a corridor, but also in aliving room, in a study or in a bedroom. It could also be inserted into abathroom. Thisplanter could also be transformed into a gueridon table by resting on top ofthe tub or replacing it, a glass or marble top.