A Maria Theresa Style Glass and Gilt Metal Chandelier

A Maria Theresa Style Glass and Gilt Metal Chandelier

The chandelier has a scrolling gilt-metal frame sheathed throughout in glass, arranged in two tiers around a central baluster stem of blown-glass knops and urns. The upper tier of scrolled arms issues further lights. It is surmounted by crowning arms hung with grape-cluster drops and glass rosettes, with obelisk-form finials rising from lobed glass cups. The lower tier of serpentine arms carries candle nozzles on fluted, scalloped glass drip-pans. The whole is profusely hung with cut-glass rosettes, grape clusters, faceted prisms and large shaped pendants of Maria Theresa form. It terminates in a faceted glass ball.

NOTE

Italian or Austrian, Mid 20th Century

The glass-sheathed frame chandelier takes its name from the Empress Maria Theresa of Austria (1717–1780), whose court popularised the type in the mid-18th century. It was produced principally in Bohemia and Vienna. In this form the metal armature is almost entirely concealed beneath glass tubes and dressings, so that the structure itself appears to be made of light. The model has remained in continuous production ever since, notably in Bohemia and in Italy, where Venetian and Lombard workshops made examples of considerable scale and exuberance throughout the 20th century. The present chandelier, with its double tier of scrolling arms, grape-cluster drops and generous pendant dressing, is a particularly full and lively example of the type.