102,500 CHF
Michael Hoffrichter, Auguste Vindelicorum (Augsburg), circa 1673. Very fine and important 20K gold and painted on enamel pre balance spring, single-hand pendant watch. Two-body with curved-in edge, deep back decorated with a portrait of a seated lady in a "Spanish" dress, holding a fan, a park in the background, the band with four cartouches depicting rural landscapes, inside Venus in a chariot pulled by a pair of doves, with her son Cupid holding the reins. Gold, chased, large champlevé radial Roman numerals, half hour markers. Blued steel "arrow" hand. 31.5 mm., hinged, full plate, baluster pillars, fusee and chain, four-wheel train, verge escapemen, circular steel foliot, silver cock pierced and engraved in a symmetrical pattern, worm-wheel mainspring set-up.Signed on the movement.Diam. 37 mm. Notes The watch represents the best of the German school of enameling of the period.Recent work by Hans Boeckh has established the existence of an independent school of enameling based in Augsburg which could produce gold enameled watch cases of the very highest quality (not to be confused with the prolific but average quality copper enamel plaques produced in the South of Germany and used to decorate tables, cabinets etc.). Examples of such watch cases are however exceptionally rare, with no more than a handful known to have survived), Boeckh further explains that the iconograhy of these watches is of a totally different character to the majority of the Geneva work of the s
Auctioneer:
Antiquorum
Date:
2002-11-16
