Cabinet, creation of Daniel Arnoul

ORIGIN: FRANCE
PERIOD: XXth CENTURY, 1995

Height: 75cm
Width: 68 cm
Depth: 63.5 cm

Unique piece, signed and dated
Metal, hard stones (agate, carnelian, rock crystal), violet wood, elm burl.


Sculptor or silversmith?
Profane or sacred?
Today or yesterday?
Daniel Arnoul does not follow traditional trends.

Being a sculptor was not really his training. After starting his studies at the Louvre school in goldsmithing, and putting his talents at the service of the Puiforcat house, he became aware of his dual nature as a craftsman and artist-creator and completed his training.
In the sculptor Agam, he found the dimension, the breadth sought to give free rein to a fertile and creative imagination.

Since moving to Nice in 1980, his work has been punctuated with dreamlike and symbolic works, medieval by their inspiration and the materials used: rare metals, semi-precious hard stones, antique coins, pearls.

Thus were born portraits, reliquary boxes, fantastic animals, royal hands, jewels and cabinets such as the one presented here, an object produced since the Renaissance, but treated in an ornamentation similar to that of medieval sacred objects.

For this Daniel Arnoul travels the world, in search of rare materials (silver, vermeil, copper, ivory) of stones (agate, coral, crystal, lapis lazuli, garnet, amethysts, jaspers and carnelian), pearls, ebony and exotic wood .

The firm that we present here meets these criteria.

Raised above a succession of four platforms of decreasing size, the cabinet opening on two sides resembles a tabernacle.
The whole is adorned with silver and vermeil plates worked in repoussé, held by others in steel and revealing hard polished and crimped stones.

Four rods crowned by a rock crystal ball support this precious cabinet and crossing the four plates rest on the ground, constituting the main frame of this set.

The cabinet itself opening on both sides, by a double opening
The first, a sort of porthole reveals the interior through a circular window.
The second, falling down and pulling the porthole, reveals three drawers simulating an architectural decoration. The two lower ones slide in a removable assembly, activated when the upper drawer is pulled out, all treated in exotic wood marquetry of various colors.

Each of the plates has a circular opening in the center, and even the two drawers resting on the second and third pane, which are also circular. Their decor combines light wood and embossed vermeil plaques covered with a decoration of small pebbles.

An impression of secrecy and sacredness emerges from this work adding to the beauty of the work and the materials, an additional indefinable dimension