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Pietre dure (hardstone) table top
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This tabletop is one of the most extraordinary examples of hardstone mosaic produced in Italy around 1800, likely by the period’s leading mosaicist, Giacomo Raffaelli. The tradition of cutting highly colored, figured hardstones to form mosaics can be traced to antiquity, but Raffaelli introduced a fresh approach by organizing carefully arrayed geometric patterns against a white marble ground. Made in Milan with a variety of precious stones that were sourced in nearby Brescia, Sicily, and Tuscany, as well as farther afield in Afghanistan, Egypt, Greece, Poland, and Russia, this table reflects the growing scientific fields of geology and gemology, as well as the global dimension of European decorative arts. The rarefied nature of materials used to make the mosaic reflected the urbane, sophisticated tastes of its patrons, which, for Raffaelli, included tsars, kings, and emperors. In the early nineteenth century, this table was acquired by Charles William Vane (1778–1854), Lord Stewart, then British ambassador in Vienna. Stewart, later Lord Londonderry, was infamously known for his repression of the 1798 Irish uprising and a callousness towards the Irish during the potato famine. This tabletop owes its name to its documented presence in Stewart’s London mansion, Londonderry House, and remained by descent in the family until 2014. Jeffrey Fraiman in Gifts of Art (2025), p. 104.
Curator Jeffrey Fraiman and radio journalist Hana Baba on “Pietre dure hardstone table top”
Gallery 13
- Attributed to
- Giacomo Raffaelli (1753-1836)
- Possibly
- Giuseppe Valadier (1762-1839)
- Title
- Pietre dure (hardstone) table top
- Date
- ca. 1800
- Place of Creation
- Milano
- Object Type
- Furnishing
- Medium
- White marble slab inlaid with hardstones including agates, jaspers, lapis lazuli, amethysts and carnelians
- Dimensions
- 1 5/8 x 70 1/2 x 35 3/16 in. (4.128 x 179.07 x 89.376 cm)
- Credit Line
- Museum purchase, Roscoe and Margaret Oakes Endowment Income Fund, gift of Margaret and Will Hearst; Diane B. Wilsey; Roger Thomas and Arthur Libera; Mary Beth and David Shimmon in celebration of the Legion of Honor Centennial
- Accession Number
- 2023.79