- Museum number
- 1938,0713.1.CR
- Description
-
Toilet Pot and Cover; soft-paste porcelain; lead-glazed; cylindrical; almost flat base with traces of glaze, slightly domed cover with button knop; decorated in underglaze-blue, three panels of stylised flowers within rectangular reserves alternating with stylised flowers behind fences enclosed between blue lines; cover with blue stylised scroll and flower ornament; knop,
encircled by two lines, painted with a stylised flower; maker's mark.
- Production date
- 1715 (circa)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 5.40 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Dawson 1994
The monogram on this cosmetic pot, which once had a companion was attributed by Chavagnac and Grollier to François and Barthélemy Dorez of Lille.(1) They were the sons of Barthélemy Dorez, who was authorised to establish a porcelain factory in Lille in April 1711 and who produced examples of his wares in November 1712, and were in charge of the factory from 1720 until around 1730. The style of decoration of this piece suggests a date of manufacture early in the eighteenth century. As well as the two toilet pots, three ‘trembleuse’ saucers and a salt-cellar, each bearing a similar mark, were recorded by Chavagnac and Grollier.(2) The salt-cellar, which is now in the Musée national de Céramique, Sèvres, was illustrated with its mark by H.P. Fourest.(3) One ‘trembleuse’ saucer formerly in the Gasnault Collection is now in the Musée national Adrien-Dubouché, Limoges,(4) and another saucer is in the Musée national de Céramique, Sèvres.(5) A heavily-potted salt-cellar decorated in underglaze-blue bearing the same mark is in the Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, County Durham (formerly Goldblatt Collection, London).(6) The mark on a glazed white figure of a girl in ‘sabots’ formerly in the Grollier Collection(7) may be compared with the marks on the pieces mentioned above.
However, Chavagnac and Grollier admitted that the marks were difficult to interpret with any certainty. They discounted a previous attribution to François Boussemart since they found no documents to prove that he ever made porcelain at Lille, and established a porcelain factory at Arras (q.v.) only in the 1770s. They also ruled out a faïence manufacturer named Jean Bossu. Their reading of the monogram on this pot, once accepted by this writer as plausible, has now been revised to ‘JB’, the earliest and the most evident reading. It has been suggested(8) that the maker was Jean-Baptiste Bellevaux, operating in Paris in around 1715, when he was prosecuted for making porcelain.
1. Chavagnac and Grollier, 1906, p. 44.
2. Ibid., p. 46.
3. H-P. Fourest, Origines de la porcelaine tendre en France au XVIIIe Siècle, ‘Cahiers’, no. 16, 1959, p. 243, fig. 20.
4. Inv. 1179.
5. Inv. 8344.
6. P. Klaber, The Enid Goldblatt Collection of Continental Porcelain (Part 2), ‘The Antique Dealer and Collectors' Guide’, August 1984, p. 30., fig. 1b, inv. Cer. 1988.191.
7. Chavagnac and Grollier, 1906, p. 47, in Musée national de Céramique, inv. MNCS 13364.
8. By Bernard Dragesco, to whom the writer is indebted.
Exhibited: Paris, Exposition nationale de Céramique, 1897, no. 431.
Literature: Chavagnac, comte Xavier de and Grollier, marquis de, ‘Histoire des manufactures françaises de porcelaine’, Paris, 1906, p. 46.
- Location
- On display (G46/dc16)
- Condition
- Cover chipped.
- Acquisition date
- 1938
- Acquisition notes
- Comte de Chavagnac Collection, Lot 294 with another (possibly now in New York, French Institute), Paris, Hotel Drouot, 19-21 June 1911.
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1938,0713.1.CR
