Description
Francois Linke 1855-1946
A Louis XV style gilt-bronze mounted Kingwood & rosewood centre table. The shaped top quarter veneered in rosewood with a gilt bronze band and wide kingwood banding, above a slim frieze with central drawer. The table is raised on four cabriole legs headed by female busts flanked by trailing acanthus scrolls and terminating in ormolu sabots. Mounts marked ‘FL’ to the reverse.
Height 29 1/2” (75cm)
Width 55 1/2” (140cm)
Depth 30 1/2” (77.5cm)
French
Circa 1900
Linke was born in Pankraz in Bohemia and was celebrated by the French as one of the greatest ébénistes of meubles de style at the turn of the century. He began his apprenticeship with a Bohemian master at the age of thirteen. Four years later, he toured Austria, settling and working in Vienna for two years. Linke arrived in Paris in 1875, and by 1881 he had established his own small workshop at 170 rue du Faubourg St. Antoine. Taking 18th century styles as his starting point and adapting earlier styles to contemporary taste, Linke produced fine quality furniture, steadily expanding his business during the next 20 years. He firmly established his reputation after receiving a gold medal at the Paris Universal Exhibition of 1900 for his extraordinary Grand Bureau. Today, as in the past, Linke is best known for the exceptionally high quality of his work, as well as his individualism and inventiveness. All of his work has the finest, most lavish mounts.The technical brilliance of his work and the artistic change that it represented has never been repeated.
