With their naturalistic acanthus branches and oak leaves issuing from a central scroll, these wall-lights reflect the Louis XV pittoresque style in its purest form. Such elaborate and ambitious types of objects were executed by various bronziers in the 1740s and 1750s, including the orfèvre and fondeur du Roi Jean-Claude Duplessis père as well as the famed Jacques Caffieri, and promoted by marchands-merciers such as Lazare Duvaux. The hound heads found on the present wall lights are most likely symbolic of the hunt; a popular theme in French decorative arts in the 1700s. A number of Louis XV and Louis XVI ormolu object featuring dogs, boars, stags, hunters and other attributes of this noble pastime are known. These include a pair of Louis XVI chenets by Quentin-Claude Pitoin in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (inv. 1977.102.5 and 1977.102.6); a Louis XV pair in the Rhösska Museum in Göteborg (inv. RKM 5:a-1951 and RKM 5:b-1951); and a pair of wall lights sold Christie’s, London, 12-13 January 2005, lot 392. The inventory prepared upon Caffieri’s death in 1755 also lists a pair of chenets cast with hound figures: “un autre modèle de garniture de gril représentant d’un côté un chasseur lançant un épieu sur un sanglier et de l’autre une amazone et deux chiens.” Furthermore, hunt-themed works by Caffieri are known to have been to delivered the duchess of Parma, daughter of Louis XV. These include chenets, one of which is signed by Caffieri, now in the Quirinale, Rome, see A. González-Palacios, Il Patrimonio Artistico del Quirinale: I Mobili Francesi, Milan, 1996, pp. 264-7, cat. 67-68.