ANTIQUE WOODEN FIREPLACE WITH ART DECO ARCHITECTURAL LAYOUT, ALBEIT WITH SOME FASCINATING AND VERY FINE ART NOUVEAU DECORATIVE REMINISCENCES. PARIS WAS ITS MAISON, ESSENCE OF PINE ITS MATERIAL..
The period is from the 1920s to the 1930s...
In Italy raged (and it could not have been otherwise..) the “Littorio” style, which then was nothing but a more “imperialistic,” more “Roman,” more serious Art Deco..
The fireplaces had to be of strict line and, if possible, made of Travertine....
In France the more properly Art Deco fireplace had the upper hand over the Art Nouveau and floral ones, but it was a Pyrrhic victory, after all, in the soul of that nation (and in my opinion of all European nations, excluding, for different reasons, England and Italy) there was still, strong, the loving memory of Art Nouveau and its permissiveness of lines... As proof of what I am saying is the fact that almost all educated French people, when they talk about Art Deco and/or Art Nouveau fireplaces, use to speak, generically, of “Art Nouveau fireplaces,” as if these two styles were just two currents of the same soul...
In the case of this specific mantel, we have a very obvious general Art Deco' architectural layout (moreover, with some happy classical affectations such as dentils, ovules and so on..) combined with curvilinear elements and floral decorations...
IN SHORT, IN THIS FIREPLACE THE MARRIAGE THAT MANY DON ABUNDIO INTEND TO DENY IN THE NAME OF CONSERVATIVE ACADEMIA IS ACCOMPLISHED AT THE PROPER ALTAR OF NATURALNESS AND FEELING.
