Important Modern & Vintage Timepieces

Geneva, Nov 08, 2014

LOT 578

EXCEPTIONAL EARLY & SMALL SINGING BIRD CAGE CLOCK WITH AUTOMATON JUMPING BIRD & AUTOMATON WATERFALL Attributable to Jaquet-Droz et Leschot, Geneva, "oiseau chantant et sautant de perche en perche", the metalwork attributable to Frères Billon, the movement to Henri Maillardet. Made circa 1785. Exceptional, extremely fine, rare and diminutive, gilded-brass, automaton singing bird table clock with "jumping" early-type painted bird with automated beak, wings and tail and automaton waterfall activated at will and by the clock every three hours.

Octagonal, gilded brass, the domed top with urn finial, four pierced and finely engraved panels each centered by a caduceus in an oval and surrounded by scrolls, the corners with pierced and engraved scroll panels, the four side panels pierced and finely engraved with the sun in splendor in the center surrounded by lightning bolts and flames, the corners with pierced and engraved husk scrolls, eight outset pillars with urn finials, the interior floor of the case with pierced and engraved panels of stylized water plants and a large fish in each corner, central automaton waterfall with rotating glass rods on a gilt-bronze shell base and cast and chased domed leaf cap, octagonal base with radiating oval engine-turned panels, finely cast and chased ball and claw feet, winding arbor and activation/stop lever in the side of the base. White enamel with Arabic numerals, outer minute track, movement regulation sector and hand above 6 o'clock, winding aperture below 12 o'clock. Blued steel Breguet hands. SINGING BIRD MOVEMENT brass with skeletonized plates, large going barrel, fly governor, fusee and chain wound via a pinion and contrate wheel driving a large 5-spoked brass wheel and mounted on the arbour above the complicated pierced and notched cams for the control of the waterfall, the bird's automation and the birdsong, rectangular brass whistle with piston, circular bellows, the bird operated by a system of chains running up a tube on the back panel of the cage and into the fast-moving pivoted arm supporting the bird which allows jumping from perch to perch during activation. THE BIRD finely made metal body with delicately painted feathers, black glass eyes, automated beak, tail and wings and turning on its axis. THE CLOCK gilt brass with shaped rectangular plates, a lever arm with weighted end on the backplate to activate the bird and waterfall every hour, fusee and chain, verge escapement, three-arm balance, flat balance spring, pierced and engraved cock with polished steel endplate, regulation from a hand on the dial. DIM. 22.3 x 11.4 x 11.4 cm. This exquisite singing bird cage can be firmly attributed to the firm of Jaquet-Droz and Leschot and is dateable to the closing years of the 18th century. The small size and charming proportions along with the magical jumping effect of the bird are particularly desirable and the delicacy of workmanship in the cage's construction and the "ball and claw" feet are distinctive of the workshop of Jacquet-Droz. Along with their associate Leschot and an extraordinary artisan named Jacob Frisard, Jaquet-Droz became by far the most inventive masters of singing birds during the second half of the 18th century. Their dominance in this field came about to a great extent due to the invention, attributed to the Jaquet-droz, of the whistle with sliding piston which superseded the more cumbersome and unconvincing serinette to give a much more realistic imitation of birdsong, producing notes with great naturalness and freedom. These mechanisms with "one flute", that is, with a sliding piston flute were already commonly used by Leschot by 1796. It is interesting to note that in the Jaquet-Droz and Leschot general inventory of 1791 there is mentioned "two cages with hopping bird....song "courbes" unfinished", therefore providing documentary evidence that at this date the company were making singing birds with "hopping" or jumping birds - one of the wonderful features of the present bird cage. The "jumping" is achieved by the bird "flipping" between the two perches on a pivoted lever moving at such speed it is almost imperceptible to the eye and so adding to the naturalistic illusion. Very few cages exist with jumping birds. The bird itself, beautifully constructed and with glass eyes and bone beak and delicately painted is one of very few known examples with a painted bird rather than the more usual feathered variety. The metal body is very well finished with extremely fine, almost invisible joints for the flapping wings and wagging tail. The present painted bird can be compared to another cage of similar size also attributed to Jaquet-Droz et Leschot and having painted jumping bird and waterfall which is illustrated in "Flights of Fancy", Sharon & Christian Bailly, p.131. The waterfall automaton is also a characteristic of the cages of Jaquet-Droz, the inclusion of this extra complexity again adds to the visual delight of the piece, it is a very rare feature of a bird cage of this small size. It is likely that the cages with waterfalls were destined for the eastern market as were most other automaton curiosities of the period. Two similar but slightly later cages are known: Collection de Madame A. Iklé-Steinlin, Saint-Gall, see: Chapuis, 1931, fig. 116 and another in the Musée du Serail, Istanbul, Chapuis et Droz, 1949, fig. 261. PIERRE JAQUET-DROZ (1721- 1790) Born on July 28, 1721 in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Pierre Jaquet-Droz was the son of a farmer who was an occasional clockmaker as well. He studied humanities and philosophy in Basel from 1738 to 1739 and then became interested in horology. We know little of him as a person, only that he was sober, serious, taciturn, and very careful in his work. On October 25, 1750, Pierre Jaquet-Droz married Marianne Sandoz, the daughter of Civil Lieutenant Abraham Louis Sandoz, who was later to accompany Pierre on his trip to Spain. At the age of thirty-four, Pierre Jaquet- Droz was left a widower. He never remarried, and seems to have devoted himself to his work as a watchmaker with all the more intensity. The second child of Pierre Jaquet- Droz and his wife Marianne, Henry-Louis, was born on October 13, 1752. Recognizing that he was a gifted child, his father sent him to Nancy to study music, science, mathematics, physics and drawing. In 1758, Jaquet-Droz made the long and difficult journey to Spain, to present his works to King Ferdinand VI. When he returned, the sum he brought back enabled him to devote himself to the making of the famous Jaquet-Droz automata, the writer, draughtsman, and musician, and to found the successful Jaquet-Droz firm, in London and Geneva, for the making of extraordinary mechanical and musical pieces. Upon his return in 1769, Henry-Louis took his place in his father's work-shop alongside Jean-Frederic Leschot (1746-1824), an adoptive son. It was the beginning of a close and fruitful partnership between the three men. Pierre Jaquet-Droz was the first to make singing bird boxes and enjoyed an excellent reputation for complicated clocks, Neuchâtel clocks and automaton timepieces. When Pierre Jaquet- Droz grew old, the firm was taken over by his son Henry-Louis and Jean Frédéric Leschot, under the name of Jaquet-Droz & Leschot. Pierre Jaquet- Droz died in Biel in 1790, at the age of 69. Upon his father's retirement from the family firm, Henry-Louis naturally replaced him, traveling to London to look after business. He also maintained an active interest in the Société des Arts, studying questions related to the well-being of the Genevese "Fabrique" and seeking solutions to problems which plagued his colleagues and fellow members. Henry- Louis' health was poor, however. Despite a journey undertaken to improve his condition, he died in Naples in November 1791, at the early age of 41. Subsequently, Jean Frédéric Leschot took over the firm.