The exterior painted after Watteau with vignettes of musicians and lovers in landscapes within lightly molded scrollwork cartouches, the interior after Nicolas Lancret with ‘Brother Philippe's Geese’, the mount inscribed With Best wishes from the Queen to Emmie Ricardo, Xmas 1933
3¹⁄₈ in. (7.9 cm.) long

S.J. Phillips, London.
Acquired by Annie Laurie Crawford, later Aitken (1900-1984) from the above.

Conditions of Sale
FAQs
This lot is offered by Christie's Inc

Brought to you by

Lot Essay

The scene on the underside of the box is derived from Pierre Aveline’s engraving after Jean-Antoine Watteau’s painting Les Charmes de la Vie⁽¹⁾. The interior of the cover is derived from an engraving after Nicolas Lancret’s painting Les Oies de Frère Philippe, based on a fable by Jean de La Fontaine. Philippe, a widower, retreats into life as a hermit, taking his son with him. After years in solitude, they come upon several young ladies. When the son queries what they are seeing, his father answers "a party of geese." Compare with the painting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, object no. 2004.86.

1. See Claudia Bodinek, Raffinesse im Akkord, Dresden, 2018, vol. 2, p. 532, fig. 397 for an illustration of this print.