Decorative Arts

The word "furniture" (Latin - mobilis, "movable") means anything that is loose - that is to say everything that can move - and is intended for housing development. The furniture reflects the reality and evolution of different cultures and eras. If its functional aspect is of course important, he was also sometimes invested with a symbolic function (head curule senior Roman magistrates, cathedra of bishops...). Her appearance, finally, gives the furniture a value sometimes well above its use value.

Each period is characterized by a certain type of furniture, due to usage, and the use of certain materials, construction techniques and workmanship, the use of a particular setting. These elements help define the styles of furniture.

Ancient Egypt

Pharaonic Egypt is experiencing very elaborate furniture. It was found in good condition in some royal tombs or dignitaries, such as that of Tutankhamen (1346 BC), who delivered magnificent objects and frescoes showing carpenters and sculptors at work, and their production: chairs, beds, and chests.
Wealth of scenery

This furniture, sometimes simply made of square timber, can be decorated with paints geometric designs on white or partially carved and gilded, sometimes inlaid with ebony, ivory, glass paste.

Variety of forms

Pegged mortise and tenon, miter cuts, dovetails provide a good fit. The seats are in varied forms: stools, folding stool with four legs with many spacers, chairs and thrones, often with backs bent and tilted. The spilled then be supported by two or three amounts squares, and the leg is often carved in the shape of lion's paws, the seat is concave or flat, strapped with leather straps or rope, as the chassis of the beds. The seats have a board foot more or less decorated and a removable head support of wood or ivory. No large tables, it seems, but the circular pedestal.

The containers for jewelry or toilet articles and chests for clothes often have feet to insulate them from the ground. The cover, flat or curved, and the walls are decorated with geometric and figurative decoration, with characters, animals and stylized plants.

The Greek and Roman world

Few pieces of classical antiquity have survived. However, information we are given, both in the texts by the bas-reliefs and paintings.

Greece

The Greeks have experienced massive thrones, decorated with precious materials, but also simple folding stools, and four turned legs, and klismos, elegant chairs with flared legs for "saber" and clipboard folder Chamber. Meals get caught lying on the kline, a high bed, feet adorned with wreaths, near which stood a small table light. The chest will be replaced in the Hellenistic period by the cabinet.

Rome

Roman furniture, a wide variety of shapes and materials, especially after the conquest of Greece and Asia Minor, is characterized by a concern for comfort and luxury. The bed high, with turned legs, requiring the presence of a step, has mattresses, pillows and fabric trimmings of gold, the headrests can be shaped head of a swan or mule with silver inlay. The bed for the meal is an iron riding around the table. Pedestal bronze and marble top or precious wood, folding tripod or not, sometimes bronze or silver, marble table, on a base shaped winged griffin, are distributed in Housing. The seats are equally varied, ranging from folding stools iron, passing through the chairs mimic the klismos chairs or high back and rounded, not to mention the marble thrones. This furniture, spread throughout the empire, will be an inexhaustible source of inspiration in modern times.

The middle Ages

During the era of invasions in the West furniture is distinguished by its crudeness. Meanwhile, in the Byzantine Empire, continues a tradition of luxury and elegant decor.

The High Middle Ages remains the throne said Dagobert, bronze, Roman-inspired miniatures and texts but we misinform on this day. Especially from the XIII^th century that develops new furniture: wardrobes for vestments, heavy chests bound and adorned hinges, serving as storage, seat or even a bed.

The XIV^th and XV^th century see revealed a robust structure made furniture frames and panels, resulting in a cubical. The sculpture on the oak furniture, sometimes drowning, incorporates architectural motifs: fenestration on the panels pinnacles on the amounts, foliate frieze, animals or characters (Knights) are rarely treated; parchment folded towel or folds are common furniture and paneling. The seats are varied, from the rustic three-legged stool, the stool through the various quarters, including the chest and bench seat rotates the high back chair at the householder, in cash to the throne of Martin of Aragon. It sets the table with a few planks laid on trestles and covered everything with a large tablecloth. The buffet and sideboard can store the dishes and to show a game, while the trunk is used to store clothing. The bed is enclosed by curtains and has a canopy suspended from the ceiling or supported by four columns.

Renaissance

At the beginning of the XV^th century, while the rest of Europe is still suffering the influence of Gothic, Italian research in ancient Greco-Roman thought patterns and themes of inspiration for art. The architecture and furnishings are transformed by drawing extensively in the ornamental vocabulary antique articles, ovals, foliage, grotesque mythological, plus columns, pilasters, niches and pediments. When the Renaissance began to spread in Europe in the early XVI^th century, many motifs and themes spread through burning.

The techniques of scenery diversified. In Italy, practice painting on panels of chests, cabinets or closets, and parquetry, Florentine specialty, then produced in Augsburg in the XVI^th century, giving rise to surprising tromp L’Oreal still life’s and landscapes. The sculpture in bas-relief on panels with some prospects of architectures and half round bump on the amounts is practiced throughout Europe, as well as the shooting, which allows for columns, balustrades and tops. Finally, the moldings, extensive, mark the great divisions of the cabinet.

At the beginning of the XV th century European furniture is perfect abruptly (beds, chests elegant) and enriched with new types. Appear during the period in Italy, Cassone, large trunk-shaped sarcophagus, often carved in the round, firm and Sgabello, ladder-back fan. In France seat clamps and table legs in range are derived from Italian models, the chair arm gradually supplants the pulpit, as well as the cabinet with two bodies, then one piece, often richly decorated, which replaces the chest where the clothes were kept.