A Large Pair of Sèvres Style Green Ground Porcelain Vases

Object Description

A Very Large and Impressive Pair of Gilt-Bronze Mounted Sèvres Style Green Ground Porcelain Vases.

Stamped to the reverse of the bronze mounts ‘KK’. The painted reserves signed ‘Quentin’.

The body of each vase is finely decorated with painted reserves depicting allegories of the arts to the front and landscapes with a lake to the reverse. Set against a vivid apple-green ground with gilt-emboss decorated frames. The trumpet shaped necks and conical lids each with gilt-tooled reserves, finely painted with attributes of the arts and music, surmounted by pineapple finials. The sides with handles in the form of gilt-bronze female masks. Each vase is raised on a spreading fluted socle atop a chamfered square section base.

France, Circa 1890.

Object History

The vase with a seated lady painting an oval canvas represent the Muse Urania, from Greek Mythology. Her painting of the rising sun is titled ‘Le Fais Fleurir Toutes Choses’ (Make All Things Bloom). She is attended by a putti holding an artists’ palette besides a sculptural tablet. Two further putti are engaged in the art of writing and bookbinding. The other vase shows a seated figure of Calliope, the beautiful goddess from Greek mythology who inspires artists. As the Muse of Epic Poetry, a sheet of sonnets rests beside her, she attended by cupid with a mask, representing the theatre, and by children with trumpet and lyre, representing music and poetry.

Object Details