Pair of candlesticks

Gilles-Claude Gouel

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In the era before gas lighting and electricity, candles played a principal role in illuminating the domestic interior. The number of candles lit was an indication of the wealth and status of the owner: beeswax candles burned clean, had a pleasant smell, but were quite expensive compared to those made of tallow. In late seventeenth-century France, a change in dining habits had a significant effect on the production of silver candlesticks. Entertainment was increasingly orientated towards the evening and elegant lighting became an important part of the interior decoration. This pair of candlesticks, made in Paris in 1729-30 by Gilles-Claude Gouel clearly indicates the longevity of certain design elements. The angled baluster with shell ornament is like the ornament found more than thirty years later on another pair of candlesticks in the Museum’s collection (58,50.3,.4.).

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art