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Charles X Gothic Revival Gilt and Patinated Bronze and Siena Marble Inkwell

Charles X Gothic Revival Gilt and Patinated Bronze and Siena Marble Inkwell

$1,250

Status: Available

  • Circa 1820s

  • Inv Number:
  • #2142

About

Of rectangular shape, decorated with gothic cathedral arcades, with two wells and two pen holders, raised on a Siena marble base raised on scrolled feet.
Between the twelfth and sixteenth centuries, the Gothic style dominated European architecture. Defined by its intricate ornament and unprecedented building heights, the Gothic style was most frequently used in cathedrals and religious buildings, as well as in early universities like Oxford and Cambridge. Design elements associated with Gothic architecture include lancet (pointed) arches, soaring spires and towers, flying buttresses, trefoils, quatrefoils, and delicate stained-glass windows. By the late eighteenth century, inspired by the rise of Romanticism, and the new literary form of the Gothic novel, including Frankenstein (1818) by Mary Shelley, the Gothic Revival style became popular in England and the Continent. 
More generally, revival styles, such as the Gothic Revival, became linked to national identities. Coinciding with the Romantic movement in literature as seen in the works of Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832), Alexandre Dumas (1802–1870), and Victor Hugo (1802–1885), revivalist designers in the decorative arts also looked romantically to the past to escape the modernity of their industrialized century.
Both England and France laid claim to the Gothic as its indigenous style, unlike the borrowed classical styles of ancient Greece and Rome. Although the Gothic style was used for architectural follies in the eighteenth century, the Gothic Revival in the nineteenth century was adopted as an antidote to classicism and to reinforce a religious seriousness following the Enlightenment of the previous era. The style, which was deemed suitable as interior decoration for personal libraries and studies, was utilized for most disciplines, including architecture, furniture, ceramics, glass, silver, and textiles.

3in. high, 6.8in. wide and 3.2in. deep