Lot Essay
Jacques-François Micaud, père, active at Sèvres 1757-1801
Bleu 'Fallot' is the name given the bright overglaze ground colour developed by a worker in the ground-colour workshop active at Sèvres from 1764 and later a painter, gilder burnisher and enameller. It is often gilt with oeil-de-perdrix and decorated in rich enamels with fruit and flowers in areas where the coloured ground has been scraped away. This style of flower painting, termed encrusté and also known as early as 1764, was later copied by the Paris factories of La Courtille and Samson.
The present vase is from a group of similarly decorated pieces produced by Sévres between 1768 and 1770. A vase 'à glands' with gilt tassled cords encircling the neck of the oviform vase and hanging down two sides, sold at Sotheby's London, 15 November 1994, lot 100, inscribed with date letter P for 1768 and with the maltese cross mark of the painter Micaud, appears to have been painted by the same hand as the present example.
A related group of vases with encrusté flowers and with cameos en grisaille depicting mythological and after the Antique subjects painted by Genest may be the group of fifteen vases d'ornements purchased by Louis XV in December 1769.
From what is presumed to be this group, a garniture of three vases in the Wallace Collection comprised of a vase 'console' and a pair of vases 'à pied de globe' or 'Chinois' is painted with cameos by Genest and flowers by Micaud or Xhrowet. A garniture of five vases in the collection of Waddesdon Mannor comprised of a vase 'console', a pair of vases 'à bandes', and a pair of vases 'à palmes' also painted with cameos by Genest. In the collection of Luton Hoo are a vase 'à anses tortillées' (one of a pair, the second unlocated) and a pair of vases 'Bachelier' with no grisille decoration. In the collection of the Musée Condé, Chantilly are a pair of vases 'cannelé à bandeau'. Three vases listed in the factory records but as yet unlocated are a vase 'octagone' and a pair of vases 'Chinois'.
Cf. Marcelle Brunet and Tamara Préaud, Sèvres des origines à nos jours, Paris, 1978, pp. 96-97, fig. 185; Rosalind Savill, The Wallace Collection: Catalogue of Sèvres Porcelain, London, 1988, vol. I, C210-211, C311-313
Bleu 'Fallot' is the name given the bright overglaze ground colour developed by a worker in the ground-colour workshop active at Sèvres from 1764 and later a painter, gilder burnisher and enameller. It is often gilt with oeil-de-perdrix and decorated in rich enamels with fruit and flowers in areas where the coloured ground has been scraped away. This style of flower painting, termed encrusté and also known as early as 1764, was later copied by the Paris factories of La Courtille and Samson.
The present vase is from a group of similarly decorated pieces produced by Sévres between 1768 and 1770. A vase 'à glands' with gilt tassled cords encircling the neck of the oviform vase and hanging down two sides, sold at Sotheby's London, 15 November 1994, lot 100, inscribed with date letter P for 1768 and with the maltese cross mark of the painter Micaud, appears to have been painted by the same hand as the present example.
A related group of vases with encrusté flowers and with cameos en grisaille depicting mythological and after the Antique subjects painted by Genest may be the group of fifteen vases d'ornements purchased by Louis XV in December 1769.
From what is presumed to be this group, a garniture of three vases in the Wallace Collection comprised of a vase 'console' and a pair of vases 'à pied de globe' or 'Chinois' is painted with cameos by Genest and flowers by Micaud or Xhrowet. A garniture of five vases in the collection of Waddesdon Mannor comprised of a vase 'console', a pair of vases 'à bandes', and a pair of vases 'à palmes' also painted with cameos by Genest. In the collection of Luton Hoo are a vase 'à anses tortillées' (one of a pair, the second unlocated) and a pair of vases 'Bachelier' with no grisille decoration. In the collection of the Musée Condé, Chantilly are a pair of vases 'cannelé à bandeau'. Three vases listed in the factory records but as yet unlocated are a vase 'octagone' and a pair of vases 'Chinois'.
Cf. Marcelle Brunet and Tamara Préaud, Sèvres des origines à nos jours, Paris, 1978, pp. 96-97, fig. 185; Rosalind Savill, The Wallace Collection: Catalogue of Sèvres Porcelain, London, 1988, vol. I, C210-211, C311-313