Green lacquered oak wall bracket, Paris circa 1750

Rare wall console made of finely carved and green lacquered oak.
Curved on all sides, in plan and in elevation.
The front crosspiece is strongly curved and deeply molded.
It is centered with a "rocaille" underlined by acanthus scrolls.
The two "whiplash" uprights are embellished with acanthus and end in scrolls.
A large and exuberant asymmetrical acanthus leaf, inverted and finely ribbed, adorns the junction of the two legs and acts as a spacer.
The reserve formed by the top rail
, the uprights and the spacer forms a heart.
The sides with rear offsets are scalloped, molded and exposed.
Solid oak.
Good condition, restorations of use and small wear of the sculpture.
Luxurious yellow and violet marble veneer top, in butterfly wings on a slate background, according to the "pietra dura" technique, probably made in Italy in the XIXth century, where we found the console, to replace a French marble considered too basic.
Parisian work of the Louis the XVth period around 1750 which is to be linked to the consoles of sconces made by Jacques Lalbertaut*.
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Dimensions :

Width : 93 cm ; Height : 53 cm ; Depth : 43 cm.
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Consoles stamped Lalbertaut :

-       Console formerly in our collection.
-       Wall bracket to hang, Christie's New York sale October 19, 2007, lot 259 ; 20 000 dollars.
-       Pair of consoles, Mrs Biddle collection, Charpentier gallery sale 15 December 1959.
-       Pair of consoles, Fraysse et associés sale, 15 March 2017, lot 88.
*Jean Baptiste Lalbertaut master carpenter and Jacques Lalbertaut master sculptor.
The mysterious stamp I.LALBERTAUT is found only on wall brackets of the Louis the XVth period, it was found for the first time in 1959 on a pair of brackets from the New York collection of Mrs Biddle and presented at the sale at the Charpentier gallery.
The catalog note explains that it is probably the sculptor Bertaut mentioned in the archives of the King's buildings.
Pierre Kjellberg takes up this information in his note devoted to this stamp on page 513 of his book "French Furniture of the XVIIIth century" ("Le Mobilier français du XVIIIème siècle").
We know today that this mark refers to two brothers, Jean Baptiste mentioned in the notarial archives of Paris as a carpenter and Jacques Lalbertaut as a sculptor in 1731, and master sculptor in 1737.
The latter came from a great family of sculptors : "Les Martin".
Indeed, they are the grandsons of Jean Martin, engineer of the king Louis the XIVth, the nephews of the famous sculptor of the buildings of the king Denis Martin, whose sister Catherine married the father Lalbertaut.
They are also first cousins of the king's painters Pierre Denis Martin "dit le jeune" ("said the young")  (1643-1742) and Jean Baptiste Martin "dit des batailles" ("said of the battles") (1659-1735).
Finally, Jacques had close ties with the master sculptor Jean Baptiste Pitoin, whose son Quentin-Claude became one of the chiselers and founders of the crown's furniture storage.
It is obvious that with their family ties, the two brothers who were installed in the rue des Augustins in Paris worked extensively for the buildings of the kings, one in charge of the frames, the other of the sculpture according to the rules in force.
The archives, which are fragmentary, tell us that these brothers, called Bertaut or Lalbertaut in turns, worked in particular for the castle of Kremlin Bicêtre or for the Saint Benoît cloister in Paris.
It is important to remember that under the old regime, phonetics took precedence over spelling until Napoleon's decision to definitively fix the spelling of proper names.
After 1758, the archives make no further mention of the two brothers.
Although their period of activity is estimated between the years 1730 and 1758, very few stamped consoles are known (six to date).
This fact is probably explained by the obligation to stamp which really comes into force in 1751, which would explain that only the last part of their production was stamped.
This hypothesis is reinforced by the fact that the known consoles have a symmetrical "rocaille" decoration characteristic of the designs of the architect Pierre Contant d'Ivry in 1755.