PIETRA DURA TABLETOP. MARBLE AND HARDSTONES.

Round table top in marble and hard stone. “Vine branches and grapes”. Inspired by Italian models from the 16th-17th centuries. Circular table top with a motif of vine leaves and black and white grapes in the centre on a black background. An outer band, marked with two white lines, highlights this element and shows a variegated composition with various flowers and stems with leaves. This form of inlay, known as “hard stone work”, uses marbles of different colours and veins and stones with a hardness of over 6 on the Mohs scale. Lapis lazuli and Belgian black marble were often used for the backgrounds and, as was often the case with these materials, they had to be imported, hence the high price these works fetched. Desks, furniture, vases, plaques, etc. were made for the high aristocracy and the courts in various European workshops. The technique was born in Florence, thanks to the interest of Piero de Medici and Lorenzo the Magnificent in revitalising a Roman mosaic technique (opus sectile). From 1600 onwards, naturalistic motifs were preferred over other themes and other important production centres were established: in France, the Gobelins Factory; the Royal Workshop of Naples took over from the Florentine one when the Medici disappeared; in Spain, Charles III established another one at the Royal Site of El Buen Retiro, which disappeared at the beginning of the 19th century. The present example is inspired by this tradition. Compare with works in important collections: those kept at the Museo Opificio delle Pietre Dure in Florence, the table in the Museo del Prado in Madrid made by Francesco Ghinghi at the Real Laboratorio Delle Piedre Dure in Naples (catalogue number O00511), or the panel “Parrot perched on a pear tree” created in the workshops of the Grand Duke of Tuscany in Florence and kept at the Kremlin Museum in Moscow (Russia).

· Size: Diam. 120 cms.