(c) 2011 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston

French Window (Porta finestra)

furniture maker Unknown

Date1760-1780

Place MadeVenice, Veneto, Italy, Europe

MediumPainted and gilded wood, with gilded bronze handles

Dimensions233.5 x 101 cm (91 15/16 x 39 3/4 in.)

ClassificationsFurniture

Credit LineIsabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston

Accession numberF18w3.13

eMuseum ID730274

Original NumberF18e30-s

EmbARK ObjectID13018

TMS Source ID2047

Last Updated8/14/24

Status

Not on view

Web CommentaryWith the exception of the Little Salon, Isabella Gardner did not purchase complete rooms or attempt to assemble period rooms. In 1897, she acquired interior paneling from the Palazzo Morosini in Venice, but her installation in the museum does not attempt to re-create a Venetian interior. Rather, the panels are often mounted in unorthodox ways, even placed upside down, or cut to form new pieces of furniture.

BibliographyNotesAlberto Salvagnini. "Il Palazzo Morosini in Venezia" in La Ressegna Nazionale 56, no. 12 (1890), pp. 143-151.
Jules Sambon and Charles Mannheim. Catalogue des objets d'art et d'ameublement de Mme la comtesse Lauredana Gatterburg-Morosini, ... (Sales Enterprise of Italy: Venice, 15-21 May 1894), pp. 29-30, lot 343.
Gilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 135.
Fausto Calderai and Alan Chong. Furnishing a Museum: Isabella Stewart Gardner’s Collection of Italian Furniture (Boston, 2011), pp. 142-45, 155, no. 52J.

ProvenanceNotesLoredana Gatterburg-Morosini (d.1884) by descent from her mother, Elisabetta Morosini Gatterburg, Palazzo Morosini on Campo Santo Stefano, Venice.
Auctioned by distant relatives after Loredana Gatterburg-Morosini's death through Jules Sambon (1836-1921) of the auction house Sales Enterprise of Italy with the co-operation of Charles Mannheim, expert in objets d'art, Venice, 15 – 22 May 1894, lot 343, unsold.
Acquired by the antique dealer Antonio Settini, Venice after failed to sell at auction in May 1894.
Purchased by Isabella Stewart Gardner from Antonio Settini on 28 September 1897 for 6400 lire (for suite of twenty-one pieces of furniture and paneling).