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Lot Essay
THE WALTERS COLLECTION
Although Sarah 'Sadie' Wharton Green Walters (1859-1943) did not marry the noted American railroad magnate, yachtsman, art collector and philanthropist Henry Walters (1848-1931) until 1922, she and her first husband, Pembroke Jones, had lived with Henry as a close friend since the turn of the century, traveling the world and assembling a magnificent art collection. With the death of his father in 1894, Henry Walters inherited the core of the collection that survives today as the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore. Henry added to it, housing it in a purpose-built Renaissance style mansion in the Mount Vernon neighborhood of Baltimore and opening it to the public in 1909 as the Walters Art Gallery. Upon his death in 1931, the house and contents were bequeathed to the City of Baltimore. As Henry’s younger widow, Sadie continued the family tradition of buying art and antiques, her taste running to eighteenth-century French decorative arts. In 1941, an eight-day two-part single-owner sale was held at Parke-Bernet Galleries in New York, to disperse the bulk of her collection. The sale ran to a total of 1,456 lots, with the present vase offered as lot 679.
THE PORCELAIN
Chinese art of the eighteenth century reflected a popular fascination with imitating one material in another, here expressed in the reproduction of an ancient bronze shape in a ceramic medium. The fanghu form of the current vase originated as a square wine jar, and first achieved popularity during the Western Zhou period (c. 1046 BC–771 BC), over 2,000 years before the present vase was conceived and fired. During the reign of the Qianlong Emperor, vases of this antiquarian shape were made with various monochrome glazes, including a Ge-type glaze, as seen on a vase illustrated in Chinese Ceramics in the Idemitsu Collection, Japan, 1987, no. 960; a flambé glaze found on two vases sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 29 May 2013, lot 2279 and 1 June 2011, lot 3716; and a Ru-type glaze on a vase also sold at Christie's, Hong Kong, 31 May 2017, lot 3203.
THE MOUNTS
Framing the archaistic vase is a set of sumptuous ormolu mounts in the rocaille symétrisé style, with the dynamic but overall symmetrical rim and base mounts reflecting the influence of Jean-Claude Chambellan Duplessis (1699-1774). Duplessis was artistic director at the Vincennes and Sèvres factories from 1748-1774, and pioneered the novel style in reaction to the fanciful asymmetry of early rococo. A very similar scheme appears on a pair of Chinese celadon vases in the Wrightsman Collection at the Metropolitan Museum, New York (obj. no. 1984.471.3, .4), which were formerly in the collection of Edith Chester Beatty, London. The handles relate closely to a model invented in Paris during the reign of Louis XV, which was cleverly employed to convert Chinese vases into ewers. A number of examples of this type are recorded in notable collections in the eighteenth century. Lazare Duvaux, the most important dealer of mounted porcelains in Paris, sold what appear to have been one such pair of mounted celadon ewers to Madame de Pompadour on 6 December 1751, for the huge sum of 1,680 livres. Madame de Pompadour's pair were described as ‘Deux autres vases en hauteur de porcelaine céladon ancienne, montés en forme de buire, en bronze ciselé dorés d'or moulu'. On 3 August of the same year, he sold to the comte du Luc: ‘Deux buires de porcelaine Céladon, garnies en bronze doré d'or moulu, 720 Livres’. A further pair of ewers specifically described as being in celadon porcelain were sold in the collection of the celebrated connoisseur Jean Gaignat in 1769, when they were described as ‘Deux très jolis Vases même porcelain celadon à côtes, d’une couleur douce & un émail très brillant, d’environ 11 pouces, également garnis en formes de buires ; les ornemens très bien ciselés en bronze doré’. These ewers are illustrated in the celebrated copy of this catalogue annotated by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin. Other ewers with this type of handles include the pair from the collection of Mrs. Charles Wrightsman, sold Sotheby's, New York, 5 May 1984, lot 136 and more recently sold Christie’s, New York, 12 December 2024, lot 40; a pair in the Jones Collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum (acc. no. 818-1882), and two pairs in the Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor (acc. nos. 2166.1-2 and 2671.1-2); a further related pair of ewers was sold from the collection of Alexandrine de Rothschild; Sotheby's, London, 18-19 May 1967, lot 137.
Although Sarah 'Sadie' Wharton Green Walters (1859-1943) did not marry the noted American railroad magnate, yachtsman, art collector and philanthropist Henry Walters (1848-1931) until 1922, she and her first husband, Pembroke Jones, had lived with Henry as a close friend since the turn of the century, traveling the world and assembling a magnificent art collection. With the death of his father in 1894, Henry Walters inherited the core of the collection that survives today as the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore. Henry added to it, housing it in a purpose-built Renaissance style mansion in the Mount Vernon neighborhood of Baltimore and opening it to the public in 1909 as the Walters Art Gallery. Upon his death in 1931, the house and contents were bequeathed to the City of Baltimore. As Henry’s younger widow, Sadie continued the family tradition of buying art and antiques, her taste running to eighteenth-century French decorative arts. In 1941, an eight-day two-part single-owner sale was held at Parke-Bernet Galleries in New York, to disperse the bulk of her collection. The sale ran to a total of 1,456 lots, with the present vase offered as lot 679.
THE PORCELAIN
Chinese art of the eighteenth century reflected a popular fascination with imitating one material in another, here expressed in the reproduction of an ancient bronze shape in a ceramic medium. The fanghu form of the current vase originated as a square wine jar, and first achieved popularity during the Western Zhou period (c. 1046 BC–771 BC), over 2,000 years before the present vase was conceived and fired. During the reign of the Qianlong Emperor, vases of this antiquarian shape were made with various monochrome glazes, including a Ge-type glaze, as seen on a vase illustrated in Chinese Ceramics in the Idemitsu Collection, Japan, 1987, no. 960; a flambé glaze found on two vases sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 29 May 2013, lot 2279 and 1 June 2011, lot 3716; and a Ru-type glaze on a vase also sold at Christie's, Hong Kong, 31 May 2017, lot 3203.
THE MOUNTS
Framing the archaistic vase is a set of sumptuous ormolu mounts in the rocaille symétrisé style, with the dynamic but overall symmetrical rim and base mounts reflecting the influence of Jean-Claude Chambellan Duplessis (1699-1774). Duplessis was artistic director at the Vincennes and Sèvres factories from 1748-1774, and pioneered the novel style in reaction to the fanciful asymmetry of early rococo. A very similar scheme appears on a pair of Chinese celadon vases in the Wrightsman Collection at the Metropolitan Museum, New York (obj. no. 1984.471.3, .4), which were formerly in the collection of Edith Chester Beatty, London. The handles relate closely to a model invented in Paris during the reign of Louis XV, which was cleverly employed to convert Chinese vases into ewers. A number of examples of this type are recorded in notable collections in the eighteenth century. Lazare Duvaux, the most important dealer of mounted porcelains in Paris, sold what appear to have been one such pair of mounted celadon ewers to Madame de Pompadour on 6 December 1751, for the huge sum of 1,680 livres. Madame de Pompadour's pair were described as ‘Deux autres vases en hauteur de porcelaine céladon ancienne, montés en forme de buire, en bronze ciselé dorés d'or moulu'. On 3 August of the same year, he sold to the comte du Luc: ‘Deux buires de porcelaine Céladon, garnies en bronze doré d'or moulu, 720 Livres’. A further pair of ewers specifically described as being in celadon porcelain were sold in the collection of the celebrated connoisseur Jean Gaignat in 1769, when they were described as ‘Deux très jolis Vases même porcelain celadon à côtes, d’une couleur douce & un émail très brillant, d’environ 11 pouces, également garnis en formes de buires ; les ornemens très bien ciselés en bronze doré’. These ewers are illustrated in the celebrated copy of this catalogue annotated by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin. Other ewers with this type of handles include the pair from the collection of Mrs. Charles Wrightsman, sold Sotheby's, New York, 5 May 1984, lot 136 and more recently sold Christie’s, New York, 12 December 2024, lot 40; a pair in the Jones Collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum (acc. no. 818-1882), and two pairs in the Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor (acc. nos. 2166.1-2 and 2671.1-2); a further related pair of ewers was sold from the collection of Alexandrine de Rothschild; Sotheby's, London, 18-19 May 1967, lot 137.