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Lot Essay
The source of these designs are the engravings of Charles-Nicolas Cochin after the original drawings of Jean-Baptiste Oudry. Oudry, court painter to Louis XV and director of the Gobelin and Beauvais Tapestry works, began to make a series of drawings to illustrate La Fontaines fables at the end of the 1720s. In 1751 the financier Montenault bought the drawings with their publication in mind, and as Oudrys originals were very free and difficult to translate into engravings, he commissioned Cochin to make further drawings from the originals which Cochin then engraved himself. The first three volumes of Fables choisies, mise en vers were published in Paris in 1755 and 1756 and the final volume was published in 1759.
A similar pair of square-shaped dishes, possibly from the same service, were sold by Christie's Geneva on 20 November 1970, lot 358 and again on 14 November 1983, lot 138; and a similar shaped oblong octagonal dish was sold by Christie's Geneva on 10 November 1986, lot 87. Two similar Coalport plates dating from 1800-10 and based on Meissen originals are illustrated by Donald C. Peirce, English Ceramics The Frances and Emory Cocke Collection (Atlanta, 1988), p. 229, no. 223.
A similar pair of square-shaped dishes, possibly from the same service, were sold by Christie's Geneva on 20 November 1970, lot 358 and again on 14 November 1983, lot 138; and a similar shaped oblong octagonal dish was sold by Christie's Geneva on 10 November 1986, lot 87. Two similar Coalport plates dating from 1800-10 and based on Meissen originals are illustrated by Donald C. Peirce, English Ceramics The Frances and Emory Cocke Collection (Atlanta, 1988), p. 229, no. 223.