TWO SEVRES BISCUIT (LOUIS-PHILIPPE) MODELS OF LIONS SUPPORTING GILT-WHITE RETICULATED BASKETS (LIONS 'CANEPHORES')

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PROPERTY OF A LADY

TWO SEVRES BISCUIT (LOUIS-PHILIPPE) MODELS OF LIONS SUPPORTING GILT-WHITE RETICULATED BASKETS (LIONS 'CANEPHORES')

DATED 1843-1846, ONE LION INCISED AVRIL 1843 AND MAS, THE OTHER LION OCTOBRE 45 AND MAS, ONE BASKET WITH STENCILED LP MONOGRAM MARK FOR 1846, THE OTHER BASKET INDISTINCTLY INSCRIBED E //O-36-3

Details

TWO SEVRES BISCUIT (LOUIS-PHILIPPE) MODELS OF LIONS SUPPORTING GILT-WHITE RETICULATED BASKETS (LIONS 'CANEPHORES')
DATED 1843-1846, ONE LION INCISED AVRIL 1843 AND MAS, THE OTHER LION OCTOBRE 45 AND MAS, ONE BASKET WITH STENCILED LP MONOGRAM MARK FOR 1846, THE OTHER BASKET INDISTINCTLY INSCRIBED E //O-36-3
Each modeled as a winged striding lion wearing an embroidered saddle cloth, its back fitted with a reticulated circular basket pierced with anthemion, on rectangular faux-marble painted wooden bases
13 7/8 in. (35.2 cm.) high, overall; 16 1/8 in. (40.9 cm.) long, overall (2)

Provenance

Anonymous sale; New Orleans Auction, 1975, lot 282A.

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Lot Essay

The present model of a pacing lion was conceived in 1817 as a pair with a lioness, designed by Alexandre-Evariste Fragonard to accompany Egyptian canephoric figures bearing baskets as part of an elaborate dessert service and to flank a central basket or corbeille 'canéphore' supported by four female figures.

Jean-Charles-Nicholas Brachard l'aîné, employed at Sèvres as a sculptor, translated Fragonard's fantasy into three-dimensional reality two years later. It would appear that only the lion was ever made, never the lioness. Drawings of Fragonard's project for both and a plaster of Brachard's original model are retained at Sèvres.

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