Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna: An Imperial Fabergé Gold-Mounted Composite Hardstone Cockerel. Apparently unmarked, Work...

Description

Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna: An Imperial Fabergé Gold-Mounted Composite Hardstone Cockerel
Apparently unmarked, Workmaster Henrik Wigström, St. Petersburg, circa 1903-1917
1-3/4 x 2 x 0-3/4 inches (4.4 x 5.1 x 1.9 cm)
26 grams (gross)

In original Fabergé fitted presentation case.

PROVENANCE:
Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna;
Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna;
Prince Vasili Alexandrovich, sold April 1949;
Thelma D. Zane, thence by descent;
Private Collection, California.

EXHIBITED:
Fabergé in America, 1996-1997, catalogue no. 20.

LITERATURE:
Geza von Habsburg (ed.), Fabergé in America, Thames & Hudson / Museum of Fine Arts San Francisco: New York, 1996, illus. p. 45.


This hardstone cockerel belongs to the surviving number of composite carved hardstone objets de fantaisie in the form of animals. Fabergé scholar Dr. Valentin V. Skurlov estimates that after 1908, with the arrival of the stone carvers Kremlev and Derbyshev from the Urals, animals were created in increasing numbers until they eventually reached 15-17% of Fabergé's total production between 1910-1917. Ones such as these, mounted with gold feet, invariably came from the workshops of Henrik Wigström.

Perhaps the most famous of the animal figures were produced for the Dowager Empress' sister, Queen Alexandra of Great Britain, which were based on animals on the farm at Sandringham. The offered lot is directly comparable to a cockerel in the Royal Collection, which is almost identical and is marked HW and 72. That piece, an exquisite example of what François Birbaum, one of Fabergé's designers, referred to as 'mosaic sculpture', is also a highly realistic composite combining obsidian (tail and body) with agate feathers speckled with white highlights and is completed by a purpurine comb and rose diamond eyes. (Now in the collection of HM King Charles III, RCIN 40445). Another similar cockerel carved solely from agate is RCIN 40135.

Yet another related example in the Royal Collection is a large-scale Fabergé composite hardstone model of a cockerel which also uses obsidian and purpurine to great effect. That piece was bought by Queen Alexandra from Fabergé's London branch in 1909 for £113 10s. (Now in the collection of King Charles III, RCIN 40454).

The offered lot retains its original case, which dates the piece to the period between 1906-1915, when Fabergé had premises at 175 New Bond Street, London, and which makes it contemporary with the two British Royal examples.

Fabergé researchers Anna and Vincent Palmade have suggested that this object may be visible on the lower shelf of a vitrine seen in a photograph of Queen Alexandra and her sister, the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna at Hvidore now in the Royal Collections (Royal Collection Trust, RCIN 2103175).

Heritage Auctions thanks Valentin Skurlov and Anna and Vincent Palmade for their assistance with the research of this lot.

Property of a California Family

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