Gesso Furniture

Pair of white-painted wall shelves, each with a small, single drawer. Structurally, the shelf has an elegant, bowed front with beveled edges at the top and bottom. The serpentine bra...

This beautiful mirror and console table are partially silver leaf gilt and also show the bone color of the gesso. It features rich carved ornaments around the frame and table, such as bay leaf...

A fine large French rectangular hall or over-mantel mirror from the 19th century, featuring a moulded surround with a beautiful patinated gold-leaf - perfect for use as a free standi...

Elegant Gilt Mirror, believed to be Italian circa 1940s. It was recently removed from The Carlyle Hotel in NYC. It measures an impressive 50.5" heigh...

Beautiful antique French mirror with a fabulous crest and original slightly foxed glass. The crest is decorated with floral decoration and C-scrolls. The colour of the frame is off-w...

Gold Leaf Branches Mirror, probably Italian, circa 1960s. Retains warm original patina to both the gilt frame and mirror that only come with age.

English Chippendale hand painted and gilded marriage bed with original silk and bell flower coverings, central gilt carved shell cornice, flanking gilt ca...

Pair of American gilt carved wood girandole mirrors with flanking eagles on rock plinths perched to flee , upper and lower acanthus carved floral motif, ebonized reeded circular mold...

George III Gilt Pier Mirror - with rectangular bevelled plate, with urn and eagle surmount, hung with ball and chain and gadrooned frame - 16"w x 35"h

A pair of elegantly designed floor lamps raised on octagonal bases with stepped form and gilt finish. Each with carved lappet motifs to the tops of bud form bases with painted shafts...

A stunning Art Deco mirror featuring the original glass. The swirl motif frame is hand painted in French blue. There are aged defects to the silver in the mirrored glass. The glass c...

A fine Italian 19th century oil painting on canvas "La Madonna della Seggiola" after Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino 1483-1520) The circular canvas depicting a seated Madonna holding an infant Jesus Christ next to a child Saint John the Baptist, all within a massive carved gilt wood and gesso frame (all high quality gilt is original) which is identical to the frame on Raphael's original artwork. This painting is a 19th Century copy of Raphael's Madonna della Seggiola painted in 1514 and currently exhibited and part of the permanent collection at the Palazzo Pitti, Galleria Palatina, Florence, Italy. The bodies of the Virgin, Christ, and the boy Baptist fill the whole picture. The tender, natural looking embrace of the Mother and Child, and the harmonious grouping of the figures in the round, have made this one of Raphael's most popular Madonnas. The isolated chair leg is reminiscent of papal furniture, which has led to the assumption that Leo X himself commissioned the painting, circa 1890-1900. Subject: Religious painting Measures: Canvas height: 29 1/4 inches (74.3 cm) Canvas width: 29 1/4 inches (74.3 cm) Painting diameter: 28 1/4 inches (71.8 cm) Frame height: 57 7/8 inches (147 cm) Frame width: 45 1/2 inches (115.6 cm) Frame depth: 5 1/8 inches (13 cm).   Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (Italian, March 28 or April 6, 1483 - April 6, 1520), known as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of composition, and visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period. Raphael was enormously productive, running an unusually large workshop and, despite his death at 37, leaving a large body of work. Many of his works are found in the Vatican Palace, where the frescoed Raphael Rooms were the central, and the largest, work of his career. The best known work is The School of Athens in the Vatican Stanza della Segnatura. After his early years in Rome much of his work was executed by his workshop from his drawings, with considerable loss of quality. He was extremely influential in his lifetime, though outside Rome his work was mostly known from his collaborative printmaking. After his death, the influence of his great rival Michelangelo was more widespread until the 18th and 19th centuries, when Raphael's more serene and harmonious qualities were again regarded as the highest models. His career falls naturally into three phases and three styles, first described by Giorgio Vasari: his early years in Umbria, then a period of about four years (1504–1508) absorbing the artistic traditions of Florence, followed by his last hectic and triumphant twelve years in Rome, working for two Popes and their close associates. Raphael was born in the small but artistically significant central Italian city of Urbino in the Marche region, where his father Giovanni Santi was court painter to the Duke. The reputation of the court had been established by Federico III da Montefeltro, a highly successful condottiere who had been created Duke of Urbino by the Pope - Urbino formed part of the Papal States - and who died the year before Raphael was born. The emphasis of Federico's court was rather more literary than artistic, but Giovanni Santi was a poet of sorts as well as a painter, and had written a rhymed chronicle of the life of Federico, and both wrote the texts and produced the decor for masque-like court entertainments. His poem to Federico shows him as keen to show awareness of the most advanced North Italian painters, and Early Netherlandish artists as well. In the very small court of Urbino he was probably more integrated into the central circle of the ruling family than most court painters. Federico was succeeded by his son Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, who married Elisabetta Gonzaga, daughter of the ruler of Mantua, the most brilliant of the smaller Italian courts for both music and the visual arts. Under them, the court continued as a centre for literary culture. Growing up in the circle of this small court gave Raphael the excellent manners and social skills stressed by Vasari. Court life in Urbino at just after this period was to become set as the model of the virtues of the Italian humanist court through Baldassare Castiglione's depiction of it in his classic work The Book of the Courtier, published in 1528. Castiglione moved to Urbino in 1504, when Raphael was no longer based there but frequently visited, and they became good friends. He became close to other regular visitors to the court: Pietro Bibbiena and Pietro Bembo, both later cardinals, were already becoming well known as writers, and would be in Rome during Raphael's period there. Raphael mixed easily in the highest circles throughout his life, one of the factors that tended to give a misleading impression of effortlessness to his career. He did not receive a full humanistic education however; it is unclear how easily he read Latin. Early Life and Works His mother Màgia died in 1491 when Raphael was eight, followed on August 1, 1494 by his father, who had already remarried. Raphael was thus orphaned at eleven; his formal guardian became his only paternal uncle Bartolomeo, a priest, who subsequently engaged in litigation with his stepmother. He probably continued to live with his stepmother when not staying as an apprentice with a master. He had already shown talent, according to Vasari, who says that Raphael had been "a great help to his father". A self-portrait drawing from his teenage years shows his precocity. His father's workshop continued and, probably together with his stepmother, Raphael evidently played a part in managing it from a very early age. In Urbino, he came into contact with the works of Paolo Uccello, previously the court painter (d. 1475), and Luca Signorelli, who until 1498 was based in nearby Città di Castello. According to Vasari, his father placed him in the workshop of the Umbrian master Pietro Perugino as an apprentice "despite the tears of his mother". The evidence of an apprenticeship comes only from Vasari and another source, and has been disputed—eight was very early for an apprenticeship to begin. An alternative theory is that he received at least some training from Timoteo Viti, who acted as court painter in Urbino from 1495.Most modern historians agree that Raphael at least worked as an assistant to Perugino from around 1500; the influence of Perugino on Raphael's early work is very clear: "probably no other pupil of genius has ever absorbed so much of his master's teaching as Raphael did", according to Wölfflin. Vasari wrote that it was impossible to distinguish between their hands at this period, but many modern art historians claim to do better and detect his hand in specific areas of works by Perugino or his workshop. Apart from stylistic closeness, their techniques are very similar as well, for example having paint applied thickly, using an oil varnish medium, in shadows and darker garments, but very thinly on flesh areas. An excess of resin in the varnish often causes cracking of areas of paint in the works of both masters. The Perugino workshop was active in both Perugia and Florence, perhaps maintaining two permanent branches. Raphael is described as a "master", that is to say fully trained, in December 1500. His first documented work was the Baronci altarpiece for the church of Saint Nicholas of Tolentino in Città di Castello, a town halfway between Perugia and Urbino. Evangelista da Pian di Meleto, who had worked for his father, was also named in the commission. It was commissioned in 1500 and finished in 1501; now only some cut sections and a preparatory drawing remain. In the following years he painted works for other churches there, including the Mond Crucifixion (about 1503) and the Brera Wedding of the Virgin (1504), and for Perugia, such as the Oddi Altarpiece. He very probably also visited Florence in this period. These are large works, some in fresco, where Raphael confidently marshals his compositions in the somewhat static style of Perugino. He also painted many small and exquisite cabinet paintings in these years, probably mostly for the connoisseurs in the Urbino court, like the Three Graces and St. Michael, and he began to paint Madonnas and portraits. In 1502 he went to Siena at the invitation of another pupil of Perugino, Pinturicchio, "being a friend of Raphael and knowing him to be a draughtsman of the highest quality" to help with the cartoons, and very likely the designs, for a fresco series in the Piccolomini Library in Siena Cathedral. He was evidently already much in demand even at this early stage in his career. Influence of Florence Raphael led a "nomadic" life, working in various centres in Northern Italy, but spent a good deal of time in Florence, perhaps from about 1504. Although there is traditional reference to a "Florentine period...

Pair of Late 18th Century Adam-Style Gessoed Window Seats English, circa 1770 Height: 26 in. Width: 46.5 in. Depth: 14.5 in. Seat height: 15 in. Reupholstered in blue cotton velve...

Italian or German anatomical bust. The profile photos are without organs. The measurements refer to the wooden base. The conditions are as per the phot...

More information coming soon… Translated from French (on the pair of scrolled consoles at the top of each print): The St. Philippe, commanded by Mr. De La Galissonnière, View of th...

Gilt carved wedding mirror. Antique gilt carved and painted gesso mirror in the mannerist style with painted plaster entwined grape leaves and grape clusters border with gilt edges w...

Carved wood with gesso and gold metal finish Regency style convex mirror.

Gorgeous Gilltwood Mirror, Spanish Colonial, Scalloped Frame and Mosaic Mirror Inlays. Spain, 1940s-1950s. The gilt frame was richly carved from solid woo...

Bring a touch of timeless elegance and rustic charm to your home with this beautiful mid-20th century terracotta horse head sculpture. Artistically crafted from clay, this bust captu...

A fine antique English barbola dressing table or vanity oval mirror with easel, circa 1920. This beautiful mirror has beveled glass and is crowned with a gesso floral swag. It would ...

Antique Spanish Colonial Poly chrome Folk Art Santos figure probably Mexico The finely sculptured and painted wood figure standing on a pedestal base, painted in polychrome colour...

A fine Louis XVI style carved giltwood and gesso mirror. The pierced scrolling crest surmounted by ho-ho birds flanking a basket of fruit over a shaped central bevelled mirror pla...

This striking pair 19th-century Italian carved wood fragments in the form of stylized dolphins, now mounted on custom Lucite bases. Originally part of a larger decorative scheme—like...

The beautiful and elegant Antique Rectangular Mirror with Cimasa and Gilding offered here is from the mid-19th Century and has its original and authentic antique ground mirror, slig...

Vintage, fully handcrafted pieces finished with gold leaf. Each mirror features a unique arrangement of geometrical wooden rays, forming an elegant sunburst design. This charming pai...

This antique French Louis Philippe mirror was made in France around 1880 and is a refined example of the understated elegance characteristic of the period. The frame features a sophi...

Spectacular pair of Griffin (lion) motif French architectural 23k giltwood Boiserie relief mirrored panels. Each panel is expertly detailed with carved griffins flanking a floral urn...

Attributed to August Stephan Sedlacek (Austrian/German, 1868-1936) "The Violin Presentation" Oil on Canvas depicting an interior 18th century scene of...

A super Victorian oval mirror on the large side, with bow detailing and bevelled mirror plate, in lovely original condition. 37" high 27" wide You are welcome to view this item at ...

Large Decorative Gilt Wall Mirror This is a lovely old bevelled mirror, it is set in a large Decorative Gilt 5” wide Frame, The mirror is in good used condition and a very decorativ...

French early 19th century mirror.

Silvio Bicchi (1874 Livorno-1948 Florence) La Mucca, The Cow. Pupil of G. Fattori. Charming pastel of a young cow in a gilt gesso and wood carved frame. Italy, first quarter twentie...

Octagonal giltwood wall mirror by Atelier RTCD Paris. “Braque” inspiration French frame. One-of-a-kind piece. Gilding to the patinated leaf. Frame width: ...

Pair of English Queen Anne burl walnut beveled wall mirrors with central gilt wood shell and foliage decorations, flanking upper star etchings, scalloped gilt foliage interior and ex...

This evocative vintage landscape oil on canvas captures a serene, atmospheric moment in nature, featuring a winding stream flanked by tall, slender trees and a distant cottage. The a...

P0220 Superb XIXth century French giltwood mirror of versatile form, can be position horizontally or vertically, having original glass with characterful foxing in giltwood frame. The frame is decorated with scrolls and floral motifs to each corners and centre of the frame. This antique mirror retains its original glass with that desirable foxing, original gilt with red oxidation showing through and original patina. This outstanding mirror can be used as a floor standing leaner mirror / full length also as a pier mirror with a console table and as traditional wall mirror...

This rare German papier mâché teaching model measures over 36 inches long and 21.5 inches tall. The base is wood and splits in two along with the cow. One side shows a beautiful real...

Large-scale ornate gilt mirror, American, circa 1940s, possibly earlier. It measures an impressive 5.5 feet width x 4 feet height approx. Retains wa...

Extraordinary Pair of Italian Carved Giltwood Mirrors with Shell and Coral Motifs, 20th Century Baroque Revival Meets Sculptural Coastal Design in the Manner of Tony Duquette A str...

This exquisite gilded French Louis XV wall mirror embodies the elegance and refinement of 18th-century Rococo design. Expertly crafted, the frame features intricate hand-carved detai...

This fire surround was salvaged from a house in South East London. Additional dimensions: Opening height 104 cm Opening width 117.5 cm.

Early 20thC English Barbola oval table mirror adorned with delicate little flowers. This rare Barbola piece retains its original backing & easel. In excellent vintage condition. ...

A stunning Art Deco-style mirror featuring the original glass. The swirl motif frame is hand painted in a natural greige/euro linen paint accented in gold then waxed. There are aged ...

A striking pair of 19th Century American, intricately carved wood Corinthian style capitals decorated with acanthus leaves and other flora. Each capital retains most of their origina...

Italian Lake Palace Ink Drawing. Italian ink drawing of island palace La Casina Vanvitelliana sul Lago Fusaro. Eighteenth century ink on paper drawing in a...

Antique arts & crafts/ late Victorian Wood and Gesso Frame with a decorative flat frame with acorns & leaf pattern. The inner frame with a string of chain. Ornate pattern on ...

A lovely Victorian bevelled glass oval gilt wall mirror, original back boards with 1886 Islington Gazette paper under, in lovely condition throughout, can be hung portrait or landsca...

French Gilt Wall Mirror This is a beautifully Decorative Gold Gesso Frame Mirror it has an oval shape in the centre with gilded piercings and Scrolls, the gilt finish is very sligh...

An English Classical mirror with swags in gesso over a metal frame, with bevelled glass.

An antique Renaissance Revival over mantel mirror offers carved wood and gesso frame having foliate, fruit, nut, and scroll elements, 19th century Measure - 60"h x 32.25"w x 3"d Ca...

Pair of French gilt wood and gesso decorative carved foliage and gadrooned hanging wall brackets, Early 19th century.

The Beautiful Gilt Rectangular Antique Mirror proposed here is from the first half of the 19th Century and has its original antique mercury mirror, slightly imperfect due to wear an...

Adolf Constantin Baumgartner Stoiloff (Austrian/Russian, 1850-1924) A fine oil on board painting "Charging Cossack Warriors on Horseback" within an ornate giltwood frame, circa 1890 Born in 1850 in Linz (Austria) Stoiloff died in Vienna in 1924. According to a research of Russian literature, he studied in the 1880s at St. Petersburg Imperial Academy of Fine Arts. He was very well known for his Russian horse...

Impressive wood carved angel with amazing detail. Certainly the work of a master carver. Found among the entire contents of a Catholic Church in the Midwest which was said to have cl...

Rich in texture and geological history, this antique petrified wood stump table serves as both a sculptural accent and a functional surface. Naturally fossilized over millennia, the ...

A very fine and rare pair of French 19th century Empire style giltwood carved and ebonized gesso figural console tables with figures of winged lions and f...

An Italian pair of hand-painted paper mâché male busts. These vintage art decorations from Italy have been artfully composed of paper mâché and hand-painted in the depiction of two b...

A French Empire small giltwood and gesso decorated mirror, 19th C.

Monumental and really unusual. This asymmetric, biomorphic, looking glass is sure to not be a mass produced item. Playful and imposing. The pillowed surface of the wood makes you thi...

French Louis XVI gilt wood mirror with nicely carved details, surmounted with an intricately carved crown with a central urn form, quiver and arrow, acanthus leaves and plant forms. ...