Set Of Six Finely Carved Walnut Portrait Panels Depicting Great Poets And Composers

Set Of Six Finely Carved Walnut Portrait Panels Depicting Great Poets And Composers – Shakespeare, Byron, Tennyson, Mozart, Rossini And Wagner. Late 19th Century, Circa 1890.

A remarkable and highly decorative set of six finely carved walnut portrait panels celebrating three of the greatest figures of European literature and three of the most celebrated composers of the 18th and 19th centuries: William Shakespeare, Lord Byron, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Gioachino Rossini and Richard Wagner.

Each elongated panel is conceived in an architectural form with pointed upper and lower terminals and centred by a deeply carved circular portrait medallion. The sitter is identified by a carved name cartouche above, flanked by a pair of putti and surrounded by an exceptionally rich arrangement of scrolling acanthus leaves, flowers, foliage, urns and Renaissance-inspired ornament.

The lower sections are carved with attributes appropriate to the subjects. The composer panels incorporate arrangements of musical instruments, bows and other emblems of music and performance, while the literary figures are accompanied by corresponding attributes of poetry and the arts.

The six subjects comprise:

William Shakespeare (1564–1616), the English playwright and poet whose works established him as perhaps the most influential figure in English literature;

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788–1824), one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement and among the most celebrated European poets of the early 19th century;

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892), Poet Laureate to Queen Victoria and one of the defining literary figures of the Victorian age;

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791), the Austrian composer and one of the supreme figures of Western classical music;

Gioachino Rossini (1792–1868), the great Italian composer, particularly renowned for his operas including The Barber of Seville and William Tell;

and Richard Wagner (1813–1883), the German composer whose monumental operatic works transformed the course of 19th-century music.

The selection of subjects appears to have been carefully conceived as a unified decorative programme, balancing three literary figures with three composers. Such a scheme would have been particularly appropriate for the library, music room or salon of a substantial late Victorian interior.

The panels belong to the late 19th-century Renaissance Revival tradition, when historicist interiors frequently celebrated the great figures of European art, literature and music. Complete decorative ensembles of this nature are increasingly unusual, particularly when retaining all six companion panels.

H 82  x  W 27  x  D 4