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Lot Essay
The manufacture formed by the partnership between Joseph Fabri and François-Paul Urtzschneider started producing ceramics in 1792 at Sarreguemines, a mills town in the Moselle. In the early 19th Century they invented a specific composition with which, once it was polished, they were able to simulate porphyry, jasper and other precious stones. In the 1809 Exposition des Produits de l'Industrie, they were awarded a gold medal for their vases in imitation of these stones, and attract the attention of Baron Vivant-Denon, Napoleon's foremost art advisor. Consequently, the Emperor commissioned an important set of objets d'art from Fabri and Urtzschneider, including eight pairs of torchères and twenty-two pairs of vases (the latter of four different designs), at a total cost of 120,000 francs. In the French archives, these are listed as "Vases en matières imitant les pierres dures opaques, savoir le basalte brun, le porphyre brun, le porphyre brun et rouge et le porphyre brun et blanc, dans les formes et ornaments en bronze doré conformes aux dessins n. 1,2 & 4".
Sarreguemines imitations of porphyry are very scarce.
Of the few known vases there is a single one in the Palais de Trianon in Versailles, another one in the Musée National de Céramique in Sèvres while a pair is in the Château de Malmaison.
Of the Sarreguemines torchères, two pairs are in the Palazzo Reale in Naples, two pairs are in the Château de Fontainebleau, a pair is in the Musée Marmottan in Paris (illustrated in Y. Brayer et. al., Musée Marmottan. L'Empire, Paris, 1977, p.54) while a further pair, previously in the London trade, is in a Paris private collection.
The ormolu mounts which ornate these Sarreguemines wares were almost certainly supplied by the bronzier Pierre-Maximilien Delafontaine (1777-1860). Delafontaine was established in Paris in the 13 rue Saint Honoré where he also sold the Sarreguemines items (see A. Lefébure, Un bronzier fidèle au néo-classicisme: Pierre-Maximilien Delafontaine, in Dossier de l'art, no. 5, December 1991, p.26-35)
Sarreguemines imitations of porphyry are very scarce.
Of the few known vases there is a single one in the Palais de Trianon in Versailles, another one in the Musée National de Céramique in Sèvres while a pair is in the Château de Malmaison.
Of the Sarreguemines torchères, two pairs are in the Palazzo Reale in Naples, two pairs are in the Château de Fontainebleau, a pair is in the Musée Marmottan in Paris (illustrated in Y. Brayer et. al., Musée Marmottan. L'Empire, Paris, 1977, p.54) while a further pair, previously in the London trade, is in a Paris private collection.
The ormolu mounts which ornate these Sarreguemines wares were almost certainly supplied by the bronzier Pierre-Maximilien Delafontaine (1777-1860). Delafontaine was established in Paris in the 13 rue Saint Honoré where he also sold the Sarreguemines items (see A. Lefébure, Un bronzier fidèle au néo-classicisme: Pierre-Maximilien Delafontaine, in Dossier de l'art, no. 5, December 1991, p.26-35)