Fine Art & Curiosities
Painted Bombé Chest
A bombé chest built by Bay Area woodworker Matthias Murer, its sweeping curves providing an ideal ground for painted decoration. The crimson case is dressed with gold garlands, rococo scrollwork, and landscape medallions — each a small scene framed in painted cartouche.
About the Piece
The bombé form — swelling outward at the front and sides — is one of the great achievements of eighteenth-century cabinetmaking, and Matthias Murer's version is built with the care the shape demands. The curved drawer fronts and cabriole legs give the piece its character before a brush has touched it.
The decoration follows the rococo vocabulary: a deep crimson ground, gold garlands looping between painted birds, and cartouche-framed landscape scenes on the drawer fronts. Each cartouche is a portrait of the owner's property — a particular tree, a garden colonnade, a familiar view — rendered in the manner of a small oil painting and set within scrolling gold acanthus. Each of the four vignettes represents a different season along with the appropriate flora and garden goods.
The custom-made marble top completes the piece. Crimson, gold, and stone: a combination that has served decorative furniture well for three centuries, here given an intimate dimension by the landscapes within.