Louis XV Period Carved Walnut Rocaille Fireplace, Lyon Work, Circa 1740–1760.

Important carved walnut fireplace, decorated in the Rocaille style of the reign of Louis XV. The scalloped crosspiece is adorned in its center with a powerful broken shell clasp, surrounded by volutes and foliage scrolls. The uprights are decorated with lively flowers and scrolls, in an asymmetrical composition characteristic of 18th-century Lyonnais sculpture. The use of walnut, the preferred species in the region, as well as the strength of the relief, link this fireplace to local production. As Bernard Deloche (Le mobilier lyonnais) has shown, the workshops of the Rhône Valley were distinguished by a marked use of walnut and by expressive Rocaille ornamentation, which can be found both in domestic furniture (wardrobes, sideboards) and in woodwork and fireplaces intended for aristocratic residences or civil buildings. The current polychromy, predominantly light ochre and almond green, is later, but offers an old patina that highlights the sculpture. Provenance: old residence in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region (castle in Ardèche). An oral tradition links it to the Hôtel-Dieu de Lyon, which is consistent with the practices of reuse and dispersion of the decor during the major transformations of the establishment in the 18th and 19th centuries. Dimensions: Height: 115.5 cm Width: 164 cm Depth of top: 22 cm Width of hearth: 119 cm Height of hearth: 88 cm Thickness of uprights: 11.5 cm