A Staggeringly Rare and Important Inkstand, 1760
Sold
Further images
Literature
This écritoire à globes is one of only three 18th century examples of this sumptuous shape known – the others are in the Wallace Collection, London and in the Residenzmuseum, Munich. The other two are decorated with green ground colour, whereas this example has both pink and green grounds. The scenes are painted by the best painter at the Sèvres factory, Dodin. The globes contained ink and sand (for blotting) and this piece is fitted with its original gilt-bronze bell.
Sold to a private collector, 1998.
Lent to the exhibition ‘Sèvres, une passion Rothschild’, Galerie des Gobelins, Paris, April to July 2026.