Lot 126: A rare Dutch engraved mother-of-pearl and black slate plaque signed F.DE.H for Franz de Hamilton

late 17th/early 18th century the lobed baluster vase with an acathus leaf foot with finely engraved tulips, lilies, roses, carnations and daisies, on a black slate rectangular plaque in a tortoiseshell veneered frame Plaque only: 26cm. high; 19.5cm. wide; 10Din., 7Nin. Comparative Literature: Oud Holland, 1997, 111, no.2, published by the Netherlands Institute for Art History, plate 15. Reiner Baarsen, Nederlandse Meublen 1600-1800, Dutch Furniture 1600-1800, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 1993, page 37, where a table top inlaid by Dirck van Rijswijck in engraved mother-of-pearl is illustrated. Simon Jervis, 'Ebony at the Argory', Apollo, April 1998, pages 42-44. This technique of depicting still lifes in engraved mother-of-pearl, on a slate ground, would seem to have been employed widely by the Dutch, following on from their own depictions of still lifes in paintings. Mother-of-pearl shells were imported into Amsterdam in large quantities and working them became a speciality of the city. Identified Dutch artists employing this technique on plaques include Jan Visscher (1633-after 1692) and Adriaen Brouwer (1605/1606-1638). However, mother-of-pearl plaques were also made by Germans, Jeremias Hercules (d. 1689), Dirck van Rijswijck (1596-1679) and Franz de Hamilton (active second half 17th century-early 18th century). De Hamilton was a German painter of still lives and animal pieces who also worked in mother-of-pearl. He was the author of a portrait of Leopold I (1640-1705), Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, and his third wife Elenore Magdalena (1655-1720) and also executed several still lives composed of mother-of-pearl on slate. One of his inlaid flower compositions with his initials F.D.H. is part of the wall decoration in the 'Florentine Room' at Schloss Favorite near Rastatt, the summer residence of Sybilla Augusta von Sachsen-Lauenberg (1675-1733), margravine of Baden Baden, illustrated Oud Holland op. cit., plate 15. Two other mother-of-pearl and slate plaques can be attributed to de Hamilton on the basis of their close similarity to the signed one at Schloss Favorite, see op. cit. see fig.16, (one of a pair of plaques now in the Diozesanmuseum St. Afra, Augsburg).