Riesener Tin Pencil Box

Jean-Henri Riesener (French, 1734–1806)
Commode with Mahogany Veneer (detail), c. 1785–90

Tin box (measures 4 x 7 inches) of 12 triangular black wooden pencils with colored tips.

$16.95

$15.25 Member Price

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The detail shown, which ranks among the finest examples of the eighteenth-century period, is a gilt-bronze mount of a mask of Phoebus Apollo. Apollo is shown with his hair tied together both above and below his head. Two laurel branches cross beneath his chin, and rays of light stream from his face.

Riesener's artistic genius coupled with meticulous craftsmanship characteristics that elevate his furniture above that of virtually all his contemporaries are strikingly evident in this mount. Henry Clay Frick (1849–1919) purchased the commode in 1918.