A PAIR OF FRENCH ORMOLU AND CHAMPLEVE ENAMEL-MOUNTED ONYX VASES
A PAIR OF FRENCH ORMOLU AND CHAMPLEVE ENAMEL-MOUNTED ONYX VASES
A PAIR OF FRENCH ORMOLU AND CHAMPLEVE ENAMEL-MOUNTED ONYX VASES
1 More
A PAIR OF FRENCH ORMOLU AND CHAMPLEVE ENAMEL-MOUNTED ONYX VASES
4 More
Specified lots are being stored at Crozier Park Ro… Read more
A PAIR OF FRENCH ORMOLU AND CHAMPLEVE ENAMEL-MOUNTED ONYX VASES

BY FERDINAND BARBEDIENNE, PARIS, CIRCA 1870

Details
A PAIR OF FRENCH ORMOLU AND CHAMPLEVE ENAMEL-MOUNTED ONYX VASES
BY FERDINAND BARBEDIENNE, PARIS, CIRCA 1870
Each vase mounted with three geometric foliate roundels above conforming socle joined by a tripartite stretcher and supported by three tapering legs surmounted by winged griffons, on a convex-sided base, signed 'F. BARBEDIENNE.'
26 in. (66 cm.) high; 12 ¾ in. (32.5 cm.) diameter
Special notice
Specified lots are being stored at Crozier Park Royal (details below) or will be removed from Christie’s, 8 King Street, London, SW1Y 6QT by 5.00pm on the day of the sale. Christie’s will inform you if the lot has been sent offsite. If the lot has been transferred to Crozier Park Royal, it will be available for collection from 12.00pm on the second business day following the sale. Please call Christie’s Client Service 24 hours in advance to book a collection time at Crozier Park Royal. All collections from Crozier Park Royal will be by pre-booked appointment only. Tel: +44 (0)20 7839 9060 Email: cscollectionsuk@christies.com. If the lot remains at Christie’s, 8 King Street, it will be available for collection on any working day (not weekends) from 9.00am to 5.00pm

Lot Essay

The Barbedienne foundry was a pioneer of the champlevé enamel technique in the second-half of the nineteeth century, first showcasing their foray into Byzantine motifs at the 1862 International Exhibition, London. Their dominance in enamelled works coincided directly at a time when a desire for polychromy in the arts was developing, and the enamels of Barbedienne caused a sensation; vases in the present Byzantine style were particularly popular, and there are now related vases in the Cleveland Museum of Art (inv. 1996.295) and the musée d'Orsay (inv. OAO 1296 1) (see F. Rionnet, Les Bronzes Barbedienne: L’oeuvre d’une dynastie de fondeurs, Paris, 2016, p. 84).
The present pair of vases epitmize the ‘néo-grec’ style, which developed as a result of a resurgence in the discovery of and interest in antiquities and the Antique, beginning in the Second Empire under Napoleon III and Empress Eugénie. It was initially spurred by the excavations of Pompeii beginning in 1848 and was further popularized by the Louvre’s acquisition of part of the Marquis Campana’s collection in 1861. Cleverly conceived, the seated mythical griffons seen here are a reference to the common Greek and Minoan decorative motif, and the enamelled roundels to the vases and their supports are intricately decorated with stylized reinterpretations of anthemion and honeysuckle motifs, an embellishment often used on ancient Greek architecture.


More from The Collector: Live

View All
View All