This elegant Neoclassical games table is a fine example of David Roentgen's (1743-1807) mature production of the 1780's. Although made about fifteen years later than the marquetry-decorated examples from the Roentgen workshop, such as the one in the Neupert Collection, Zurich, see H. Huth, Roentgen Furniture, London and New York, 1974, fig. 129, the mechanism performs exactly the same functions, turning the smart, restrained table into four different positions with their individual uses. Apparently this multi-functional type of furniture enjoyed continuous popularity, reflecting the eighteenth-century love for complicated mechanisms and unexpected surprises. It was this mechanical aspect to Roentgen's furniture that was particularly prized by his contemporaries, being singled out for praise by even the greatest German writer of the time, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. For his most elaborate pieces Roentgen collaborated with the clockmaker from Neuwied, Peter Kinzing, and after he had sold an automaton produced together with Kinzing to Queen Marie-Antoinette in 1785 he was appointed ébéniste mécanicien du Roi et de la Reine, a rare distinction which had previously been conferred, in 1760, upon the famous Jean-François Oeben (1721-1763) who, like Roentgen, was of German origin.
David Roentgen produced the first mechanical tables of this Neoclassical model in 1771, for his progressive and exacting patron, Prince Leopold III Friedrich Franz von Anhalt-Dessau. The Prince placed them at his revolutionary country house at Wörlitz, where they remain, see D. Fabian, Abraham und David Roentgen, Das noch aufgefundene Gesamtwerk ihrer Möbel- und Uhrenkunst in Verbindung mit der Uhrmacherfamilie Kinzing in Neuwied, Bad Neustadt/Saale, 1996, Nos. 47a-b. The Wörlitz tables are still decorated with marquetry, as are the richly mounted pair made for Roentgen's principal client of the mid-1770's, Prince Charles of Lorraine, Governor of the Austrian Netherlands, which are preserved at the Museum für Angewandte Kunst in Vienna, see ibid., Nos. 67 and 68. In the 1780's, when Roentgen favored plain mahogany veneers instead of colorful marquetry, this model continued to be popular with princely patrons, as is demonstrated by a very closely related example now at Pavlovsk that must have formed part of Roentgen's extensive deliveries to the Russian court from 1783 onwards, see ibid., No. 103.
Deceptively simple in outline and decoration, this table displays Roentgen's use of beautifully-figured noble veneers, highlighted by subtly raised panels with indented corners, delicate moldings and beautifully finished mounts. The influence of contemporary Parisian ébénisterie is apparent, and indeed, not only did Roentgen study the work of his French peers, but by 1779 he was actually ordering many of his mounts from the famous maître-doreur in Paris, François Rémond (1747-1812).
Immediately during his first visit to Paris in 1774, Roentgen must have been struck by the jewellike quality of the best gilt-bronze furniture mounts produced there, a quality he realized he would never be able to match in his native country. He may have already met Rémond, from whom he certainly bought mounts in and after 1779, but perhaps from as early as 1774. Rémond's ledgers, which only survive from 1779 onwards, show that he regularly supplied Roentgen with extremely elaborate and costly sculptural mounts as well as with small, simple ornaments, see C. Baulez, 'David Roentgen et François Rémond, une collaboration majeure dans l'histoire du mobilier', L'Objet d'Art/l'Estampille, 305 (September, 1996), pp. 96-118. It is thus likely that the comparatively simple mounts on this table were supplied by Rémond. Although Roentgen’s workshop produced a considerable number of tables of this model, each piece often had some sort of differentiating decorative elements. A comparable table in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, for example, has the same finely-figured veneer but its legs are decorated with mille raies ormolu mounts and is lacking the fine parquetry border to its leaves that decorated this lot, see, W. Koeppe, Extravagant Inventions: The Princely Furniture of the Roentgens, New Haven and London, 2012, pp. 163-165. A pair of very similar tables were sold Christie’s, London, 19 May 2021, lot 50 (£93,750). Unlike the above examples, this table is mounted with jewel-like ormolu acanthus rosettes backed with disks; a feature more common on Roentgen’s more refined works. A very similar table with this type of fine mount was sold Christie's, London, 7 July, 2005, lot 535 (£46,500).
Estella Katzenellenbogen (1886-1991) was a keen art collector and patron in pre-war Berlin. She shared an impressive collection with her then-husband, Ludwig, which included major French Impressionist and Post-Impressionist artists. Divorced in 1928, Estella retained many outstanding artworks, including Manet’s Bob, which is offered from the collection of Ann and Gordon Getty in these rooms on 20 October, 2022. With the rise of anti-Semitic measures from 1933 onwards, Estella emigrated first to Switzerland in 1938 and then to the United States in 1940, where she eventually settled in the intellectual and artistic émigré community in Los Angeles. From circa 1942, she worked with Karl Nierendorf running his International Art gallery in Hollywood, which she took over in late 1945.
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