Featured CAMEOS: Show & Tell or Ask & Answer

Refresh your memory by scrolling through pix in this one. No need to read unless you want to.

Gatierre, Danbiere & Other Mysteries

 

thank you for that !!!

the pin on the brooch had me seeing something authentic..

 

A resin cameo, not a shell cameo. But the subject is pretty.

 

It's flat on the back, so not shell. Awfully pretty though. I suppose it could be one of those new dyed stone laser-cut things. Oddly I think I've seen her before.

 

Henryk Winograd also did her. If only it were possible to know where she originated.

 

Not so odd. I have photos of more than 20 of the "Danbiere" resin ones, which is what the one in the auction under discussion is. The subject has such strong appeal that these sell well even when seller states material is resin. It is not unusual for them to be set in sterling, another factor that leads people to take them at face value.

 

I am hoping knowledgeable staff can identify this beautiful Onynx cameo set in gold and rose cut diamonds. The inscription on the back reads:
Guyelant
Michelini
Paris 1870
Hopefully someone can identify the woman in the piece, The relationship of Guyelant to Michelini, and potential value of this piece. I do have a notation of Guyelant from the ART-Journal Vol VII of 1868.

 

Welcome to Antiquers, @cphammer !

Some of the more knowledgeable members will be along soon.

Meanwhile, I found a reference that refers to the carver as Guyetant instead of Guyelant. This is from the website of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Unfortunately they do not include a picture of the inscription. You can find the listing here:
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/198597
Click on "Signatures, Inscriptions, and Markings" on the left side of the page. It says
"Signature: Incised on tranche of neck: P. L." (This is Paul-Victor Lebas, the original artist -- French, active 1852–76)

"Inscription: Scratched on back in script: E. Guyetant Succs de Michelini, 1867"

Meanwhile, I will also tag two people who will probably come here soon anyway, but just in case... @Bronwen @PepperAnna

 

Thanks for the welcome! You may be correct, there is a faint cross of the first "T" when viewed with loupe. I was working off the notation from the Art-Journal of 1868. I have attached this as well, the notation is middle column, last paragraph.

 

Welcome, cphammer, & thank you for sharing your gorgeous piece with us, also for the pdfs of the Art-Journal's report on The Court of the Designers. We are always looking for documentation of who was working, where & when. In this case the reporter seems to have been rather careless, perhaps rushed.

As Figtree has already shown you, it is (Edouard?) Guyetant, not Guyelant. He was the successor to Michelini, I surmise, not artistically as a gem engraver, but in taking over Michelini's Paris shop. It is as a shop proprietor that he put his name on the Met's Lebas cameo. I'm not sure we can rely on the A-J's description of him as an artist. Dealers also displayed their wares at these exhibitions. I think Guyetant was the seller, not the author, of your cameo, which may have been sold unset. I have more documentation of 19th century gem engravers working in Rome than for ones in Paris, but Guyetant does not appear in any list I have of engravers. Based on the little bit we have, I suspect he did not discourage the idea that he was the incisore for promotional purposes, but that he could be found in some of the same sources where he is missing from the graveurs if one looked for sellers of objets d'art.

Luigi Michelini, who was himself a prolific cameo cutter in shell, originally had a shop in Rome. Sometime 1829/30 he moved to Paris, setting up again as shopkeeper & resuming his cameo cutting. He came under the tutelage of Girometti, who taught him how to work hardstone, a skill he only mastered in his later years. It was certainly not he who "founded in Paris this refined Roman art."

The "Schmall" mentioned in the A-J's write up of the Court of the Designers is surely Charles Schmoll, about whom you can find more info in this thread and in the one about cameo signatures, where you will also see Bissinger, not Bessinger.

I am so tantalized by the description that follows of a clock by Stanger that has a cameo face "upon which each hour was indicated by an exquisite spirituelle draped female figure, soaring in a circle..." I have no doubt these were the so-called Hours of Raphael.



The Apa workshop has made cameos like clock faces with the Hours.

Although in the later 19th - early 20th centuries there was a fad for cameos of what I think of as noblewomen, who seem to be fantasy creations of elaborate hair & jewels & veils, yours feels like a portrait. I don't know that we'll have any luck with an ID, but calling @PepperAnna & @bluumz

The mount is glorious. Have you scoured it for the itty-bitty marks of the French goldsmith? It strikes me as being later than the cameo itself. And have you examined the cameo carefully for any signature engraved on the front?

To have any real idea of its market value, you would need to have the gold & diamonds appraised. The greater part of the sale value would lie there. The Guyetant inscription & the fact that the Met has one like it are also selling points. To my annoyance, quality of engraving often doesn't count as much as these other things.

 

@Bronwen , your depth of knowledge is amazing, as always.

 

I agree with the subject likely being a portrait... a bride? Though she is definitely an attractive woman, she has a "realness" to her features, rather than a generic prettiness.

Agreed!

@Bronwen, et al:
I just returned from a trip to the UK and spent one of my days at the Victoria & Albert Museum... such a lot of stunningly beautiful cameos! I took loads of photos... would anyone like to see some?

 

You gotta ask?

 

I would!

 

Me, me, me!

 

I hope to organize my photos in the coming week and will post the cameos in a separate thread. I took photos of the little info plaques as well as the cameos themselves.

 

tease......

 

Of course, YESSS!!!!

 

Ugh... just realized that I have to re-size all the photos to post them here!

 

I want to thank the board for their collective experience in helping me through the cameo I presented. Very helpful. BTW there is no signature on the front only the inscription on the back. Another knowledgeable person had also suggested to me that this piece could have been made for someone but never delivered due to the death of Michelini or due to the tumultuous time leading up to the Franco-Prussian war.
This piece was purchased by a friend who had had an endearing love of the Victorian period. Sadly, she was buried today.
Thank you all again for your help!