Beautiful Louis XVI Style Chest Of Drawers By F. Linke, France, Circa 1890

Signed F. Linke

Important Louis XVI style commode with a central domed projection, in amaranth and satin veneer, with concave sides, and richly decorated with chiseled and gilded bronzes. It opens with five drawers on the front, three of which are in the belt decorated with friezes of foliage in gilded bronze. 
It is decorated on three sides with marquetry of sunflower on a crosspieces background framed with boxwood and ebony fillets. The central projection, highlighted with chiseled and gilded bronzes, is decorated with elegant marquetry representing a pastoral trophy in a cartouche. It is topped with a molded “Fleur de pêcher” marble top highlighted by an egg frieze in gilded bronze and ends with four arched legs ending in leafy clogs.

Related work :
This commode made by François Linke, and present in his photographic archives at Index 10, is inspired by a commode made around 1790 by the cabinet-maker Jean-Henri Riesener (1734-1806) and kept at the Château de Fontainebleau (no. inventory F 651 C).

Biography :
François Linke, born in 1855 in Bohemia (Czechoslovakia), worked as a cabinet-maker in Paris from about 1882 until his death in 1946. In 1900, at the apex of his career, he opened a new shop at the famous Parisian place Vendôme. He specialized in Louis XV and Louis XVI style furniture: all pieces were beautifully mounted with gilt-bronze ornaments, and he received numerous commissions. Later Linke decided to collaborate with the well-known sculptor Léon Messagé and integrated new lines and shapes announcing the “Art Nouveau” style. His great success is definitely the 1900 Universal Exhibition where he was awarded the gold medal for his extraordinary kingwood desk, designed by Messagé. At this occasion, the “Revue artistique et industrielle” commented that “Linke's stand is the biggest show in the history of art furniture”.

Born in Germany, Jean-Henri Riesener (1734-1806) came to Paris around 1755 to complete his training and entered the workshop of Jean-François Oeben, himself a German immigrant. On his death in 1763, he took over the management of the workshop and married his widow, sister of the cabinet-maker Roger Vandercruse. As long as Riesener did not have his own maîtrise, he used the stamp of J.-F. Oeben. Received maître in1768, he was appointed « ébéniste ordinaire du roi » in 1774 and, during the years 1769 to 1784, provided the Court and the royal family with sumptuous furniture in the neo-classical style. He is considered one of the best representatives of the Transition style and ended in 1769 the famous cylinder secretary of Louis XV, or “Bureau du Roi”, started by Oeben nine years earlier.