Ormolu Element.france,christofle,late 19th Century.

Golden bronze element with acanthus leaves and mythological figures.
Made in France at the end of the 19th century by Christofle, branded on the base.
Starting from the nucleus of a family -run goldsmith's laboratory, Christofle & c. It performs a qualitative leap when Charles Christofle acquires from 1842 patents for golden and silver through the electrolisi process which opens up to a new way of understanding the modeling of metals. Together with the galvanoplasty and the processing of the alloys, electrolysis becomes the way of producing in large series objects at various scale, from the domestic one (cutlery, objects also in combination with other materials) to the public and urban ones. Chandeliers and sculptural groups populate the large buildings, the result of the transformations of the Paris second Empire, as well as the tables of the nobles and bourgeois. The serial process does not mean a removal from the contribution of the artists, in the logic of the foundries. Sculptors such as Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse, Charles GuMery and others, lend their creativity for the production of sculptural groups intended for spaces and public buildings, but, at the turn of the century, also dishes, cutlery and small decorative objects are entrusted to new figures of designers. Luc Lanel and Gio Ponti (among others) ferry the company and the production techniques in the Art Déco phase and contribute to defining a different and contemporary figure of hybrid artist: the designer.