Curiosity Cabinet Object (objet de curiosité)

François Barreau made this virtuoso piece to be admired as a work of art. Its ivory shapes, arranged on four levels in intricate forms such as concentric spheres surrounding a star, would have amazed and delighted its owner. Private scholars and wealthy patrons collected intricate ivory objects such as this one to display in their cabinets de curiosité. Such rooms or series of rooms held unusual or intricate arrangements of rocks, shells, clocks, barometers, or microscopes, displaying the wonders of nature and science.

Barreau carved each intricate form from a single block of ivory. The pierced spheres and urns could not be carved by hand but were turned on a lathe, a difficult and precise technique that required great patience and skill. Scholars estimate that one sphere could take nearly two hundred hours to produce.