The Metropolitan Museum of Art - Portrait of a woman

David Roentgen: Nemours Clock

Abraham and David Roentgen were renowned German cabinetmakers whose workshop was famed throughout Europe for its exquisite marquetry work and complex mechanical devices. Proportioned for a stately public room or library, this musical clock is likely to have been the first Roentgen object to reach the United States, belonging to Gouverneur Morris, one of the nation’s founding fathers. Not only does it tell time, but it also displays the interior works, which are hidden in most clocks.

This clock, from The Nemours Foundation, is featured in the exhibition Extravagant Inventions: The Princely Furniture of the Roentgens (on view October 30, 2012–January 27, 2013).

Video/Audio (4)

David Roentgen: Long-Case Clock
(00:00:52)

The Roentgens' Berlin Secretary Cabinet
(00:02:20) 10549 views

Rolltop Desk by David Roentgen: Demonstration
(00:02:17) 16461 views

Rolltop Desk by David Roentgen: Animation
(00:01:00) 3008 views

Portrait of a woman

Date:: late 19th century
Culture:: probably French
Medium:: Colored wax with dress of applied black cloth and lace Background, slate (?) painted reddish brown Frame, wood
Dimensions:: 7-3/8 x 6-1/4 in. (18.7 x 15.9 cm)
Classification:: Sculpture
Credit Line:: Bequest of Mary Martin, 1938
Accession Number:: 38.145.9

This artwork is not on display

Signatures, Inscriptions, and Markings

Inscription: George Sand./d'après nature (Written in ink on paper covering back) [This does not, however, resemble any of the portraits of George Sand with which it has been compared]
Provenance

Mr. Fance Thompson (until 1916; sale, Anderson Galleries, December 16, 1916; sold to Mary Martin)
See also
What
Costume (41,678)

Sculpture (24,350)

Wood (7,651)

Dresses (5,294)

Painting (5,225)

Reliefs (3,153)

Wax (1,259)

Cloth (1,039)

Frames (996)

Miniature (768)

Slate (73)
Where
Europe (148,586)

France (52,276)
When
A.D. 1800-1900 (80,185)
In the Museum
European Sculpture and Decorative Arts (43,257)
Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History
France, 1800–1900 A.D.