19th Century Victorian English Porcelain Parian Busts and Statues
19th Century Victorian English Busts and Statues
Parian, or “statuary porcelain”, was possibly the most significant ceramics development in Britain during the Victorian period. Named after the Greek island of Paros for its resemblance to the white marble quarried there, parian was a bone china that contained a high degree of feldspar, which meant that it did not need a separate glaze. Decorative wares could therefore be displayed without becoming dirty, unlike earlier biscuit, or unglazed, white porcelain, which was coarse and difficult to clean. First made in the 1840s, parian was capable of being moulded without losing any detail, with the result that contemporary sculptors could have their works successfully reproduced for the mass market. Parian was also made in the USA at the United States Pottery in Bennington, Vermont.
IMPORTANT MAKERS
There remains Uncertainty as to which factory invented parian. The firms of Minton & Co. (est. 1793) and Copeland (1833-1933), both in Stoke-on-Trent, claimed to have discovered the secret; both were making parianlike porcelain by the mid-1840x, and at the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London they displayed an extensive range of parian subjects. Other famous makers included Royal Worcester (est. 1862), Coalport (est. c.1796), and Wedgwood (est. 1759), all of whom made a range of wares, figures, and busts, while Wedgwood also made impressive, large figure groups. Smaller portrait busts were the speciality of Robinson & Leadbeater (est. early 1860s), in Hanley, and others were made by the firm of Goss ( 1858-1940), in Stoke-on-Trent. Parian dominated English porcelain production for display objects for about 40 years, and a great deal survives.
PORCELAIN BUSTS AND STATUES
Models for parian were provided by eminent Victorian sculptors, whose full-sized statues could be reduced in size and reproduced in quantity for commercial sale without losing quality. The work of contemporary sculptors such as John Bell (1812-95), Raphaelle Monti (1818-81), and Sir Thomas Brock (1847-1922), together with famous Classical statues housed in museums, could be reproduced and sold to a wide public. A device known as “Cheverton’s
Reducing Machine”, patented by Benjamin Cheverton in 1844, was developed to allow subjects to be scaled down and cast in moulds for the ceramics factories. Busts were made of various subjects, including royalty, politicians, philanthropists, poets, composers, and
characters from antiquity. Figures ranged from meaningful allegories to barely disguised eroticism; for example, The Greek Slave, a controversial sculpture by the American sculptor Hiram Powers (1805-73), was displayed at the Great Exhibition of 1851 and copied by Minton & Co. Many parian figures were made either for the Art Union of London or for the Ceramic and Crystal Palace Art Union, which were lotteries set up by philanthropic Victorians to raise funds for the arts; parian works were frequently offered as prizes. The manufacture of artistic parian gradually diminished in favour of the large-scale mass production of portrait busts, and little of any consequence was nude after c.1880.
• BODY fine, highly vitrified, generally pure white
• FINISH matt, semi-matt, or with a slight surface sheen
• PRODUCTION usually slip-cast, therefore quite light
• FORMS sentimental figures; figures Of politicians, royalty, and composers; literary, religious, and allegorical subjects; copies of famous Classical statues housed in museums; works by Victorian sculptors
• IMPORTANT MANUFACTURERS Minton & CO.,
Copeland, and Robinson & Leadbeater