Art objects

Artist : Anonymous

Nymphaeum mosaic from the Villa San Marco in Stabiae (Campania), located between Pompeii and Herculaneum. After it was discovered in 1752, the Europa panel joined the collection of Charles III, King of Naples, and was acquired by the Duke of Aumale in 1854, with the rest of the collection owned by the Prince of Salerno, Charles III’s son. The panel shows the abduction of the Phoenician princess Europa by Zeus, metamorphosed into a bull to avoid making his wife Hera jealous.

Artist : Masséot Abaquesne

Between the columns of the Vestibule d’Honneur, the Duke of Aumale had two enamelled faience panels installed. The latter were executed in Rouen in 1542 by the great faience manufacturer Masséot Abaquesne. These panels were a prestigious commission by Constable Anne de Montmorency for his Château d’Ecouen. They were part of a cycle on Roman heroes.

Artist : Anonymous

The Duke of Aumale had the Psyche Gallery laid out specifically to accommodate forty-four Renaissance stained glass windows from the Château d’Ecouen. Bequeathed in 1830 by his grand-uncle, the Duke of Bourbon, they were executed between 1542 from 1544 on commission from Constable Anne de Montmorency for his Château d’Ecouen. It is very rare for secular stained glass windows such as these, depicting non-religious iconographic themes, to have remained intact to this day. They are painted in grisaille with silver yellow stain highlights.
The sketches used to make these stained glass windows are attributed to the Flemish painter Michel Coxcie. They are copies of engravings (held by the Condé Museum) attributed to the Master of the die, an anonymous Italian engraver who copied the works of Raphael.
These stained glass windows are accompanied by thirty poems featuring eight verses. The authors are Claude Chappuys, La Maison Neuve and Mellin de Saint Gelais. These poems appear in quatrains in the windows. The latter recount the fable of Cupid and Psyche, and faithfully illustrate the text of The Metamorphoses, a novel by Apuleius, a second century A.D. Latin author. The tale is presented by Apuleius as an entertaining story, told by a slightly inebriated old lady who tries to console a young girl abducted by bandits on her wedding day. But this novel on the metamorphoses of the soul and the worship of Isis is above all a coming-of-age story.

Artist : Anonymous

A substantial soft porcelain manufactory was created in Chantilly in 1725, under the patronage of Louis-Henri, Prince of Condé. Its production was influenced by a fascination at that time for an imagined Asia, one symbol of which was the elephant.

Artist : Anonymous

Up to the mid-19th century, Chantilly porcelain was decorated in a style known as Kakiemon, from the name of the Japanese creator of the kilns in Arita, in Japan, in the 17th century. Here two ferocious leopards of Asian inspiration guard pot-pourri holders in the Kakiemon style: pride of place for the white porcelain, stylised patterns, minimal palette.

Artist : Anonymous

This magnificent clock with Boulle tortoiseshell and bronze marquetry, lavishly decorated, is typical of the Regency period. The gilt-bronze feet form brackets and are adorned with women’s heads emerging from a volute of acanthus leaves wearing feather hats.

The lower part features a gilt-bronze bas-relief representing a half-naked woman, riding side saddle on a winged horse. The back of the case is decorated with a veneer of ebony and bronze marquetry, and at its centre features a bouquet of flowers in a vase amidst interlacing foliage. The dome is topped with a figure in the round depicting Time sitting on a sphere.

Artist : Charles Cressent & Etienne Lenoir movement

This rococo-style clock is based on the first model created by the artist around 1735. It is part of a series of clocks with masks portraying women wearing shells in their hair. The feet of these clocks are enriched with palms, and their dials are highlighted with flower drops. Two dragons face each other, and in the middle of these we see the head of a child blowing air through its mouth, who can be identified as Boreas, Aeolus or Zephyr.

Artist : Anonymous

The Three Graces clock is probably one of the Condé Museum’s most famous timepieces. The mechanism is contained in a celestial sphere supported by three Graces standing on a triangular white marble base. Triangular in form, with rounded angles, this base is adorned with delicate openwork gilt-bronze. The Three Graces, all identical, support themselves on their right legs, with their left legs lifted slightly to the rear. They support the sphere with their raised arms, and their heads, adorned with a ribbon, are tilted slightly backwards. Large garlands of roses and leaves hang from their hands. The sphere is made of painted tole adorned with gilt-bronze elements: stars in the upper hemisphere and a cloud crowned with a cupid shooting an arrow (which has disappeared) from his bow. On the lower hemisphere, ribbed leaves frame six stems adorned with flowers. Between the two hemispheres, a mobile enamel dial is bordered by two gilt-bronze cords. A fixed black arrow indicates the passing hours.
The model for this clock was invented by François Vion around 1765 (a model that belonged to Madame du Barry): Vion is said to have drawn inspiration from a clock featuring the three Graces by Falconet, held at the Louvre Museum. The model was quite popular in the 19th century. The clock in the Condé Museum may date from the period when France was governed by the Directory.

Artist : Frederick Dizi & Thomas Dodd

This English harp very probably belonged to the Duchess of Aumale, who was an excellent musician (she especially liked the piano). This instrument, which had been particularly fashionable since the end of the 18th century, features the latest technical innovations.

Artist : Ragot

Artist : Anonymous

This large vase is one of a pair. One was given by Louis-Philippe as a gift to the Bey of Tunis, and the other to the Duke of Aumale in 1847.

The vase in Chantilly shows four historic hunting scenes: Catherine de Medici hunting with a crossbow in front of the Château de Chambord; Louis XIII having a hunting lodge built in the Versailles woods in 1622; Louis XIV and the King of England in exile hunting together in Saint-Germain-en-Laye in 1689; and a night hunt in Chantilly, organised for the future Czar Paul I of Russia when he came to Chantilly in 1781. This imposing vase bears witness to the historicist vogue in decorative art under the July Monarchy.