Wednesday, May 13th, 2009
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
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Monday, May 11th, 2009
Paris became an important centre of porcelain production from the 1780s. Several factors led to the vast increase in the number of porcelain factories: the discovery of kaolin in the Limoges area in 1768, which enabled the production of hard paste; sponsorship by members of the French royal and later imperial families; and the relaxation of laws protecting the monopoly of the Sevres factory. The heyday of the Paris factories was from the 1790s to the 1820s, during which period at least 15 factories and large workshops were operating.
THE DIHL FACTORY
Christophe Dihl ( 1753-1830) and Antoine Guerhard (5.1793) founded a factory on the rue de Bondi in 1781 under the protection of the Duke of Angouleme. The factory’s wares of the 1780s are decorated with cornflowers (known as the “Angouleme sprig”), geometric motifs, and landscapes. The factory’s finest period was the early 19th century, when the popularity and quality of its wares rivalled Sevres. During this period the factory specialized in decoration imitating hardstones. Dihl carried out research into ground colours, producing “jaspered” effects simulating agate and tortoiseshell, usually in combination with fine gilt borders and sometimes reserved scenes. The factory also made biscuit figures of children and allegorical subjects in the Rococo and later Neo-classical tastes; these were sometimes mounted on plinths decorated in matt blue and gilt in imitation of lapis lazuli. Following financial problems during the 1820s, the factory closed in 1828.
THE NAST FACTORY
One of the most successful of all Paris factories, the Nast factory was founded in 1783 by the Austrian Nepomucene-Jean-Hermann Nast (1754-1817). The factory, which operated until 1835, produced a huge variety of items, from luxury tablewares to domestic items such as chamber-pots, jars, and lamps. Its best period was following the Revolution (1789), when it was well known for its development of matt ground colours, in particular a chrome green. Decoration could be very lavish, with high-quality gilding and painted landscapes, Classical subjects, and grotesques; in 1810 Nast developed gilt relief borders imitating bronze, used mainly on cups and saucers. The factory made a range of biscuit figures and busts of Classical and mythological subjects, Napoleon, and other personalities of the Empire period, as well as blue-tinted biscuit wares in imitation of Wedgwood, such as clockcases and candlesticks. It also sold large quantities of undecorated porcelain, which sometimes bears the marks of other Paris factories, such as Darte Freres.
THE DAGOTY AND HONORS FACTORIES
The Dagoty and Honore factories formed a partnership between 1816 and 1820, after which they operated independently again. The best-known products of the partnership were richly gilded dessert, tea, and coffee services with animal-shaped handles and spouts, and butterfly-shaped knops. Eggcups and inkwells were modelled as snails or mythological figures, and larger cups as swans, shells, and tulips. On some pieces a red ground with gilt chinoiseries, imitating lacquer, was used, which is rare and highly sought after. Coloured grounds combined with landscapes, fable subjects, and figures based on Pompeian paintings were popular.
• BODY pure white, and even, hard paste with glassy, clear glaze; the dense, slightly sugary appearance of the paste can be seen on the often unglazed foot-rims
• DECORATION simple gilt borders of Classical motifs and scattered flowers; painted scenes with coloured and gilt grounds; painted imitations of hardstones and lacquer; rich gilding
• FIGURES biscuit figures of children, allegorical subjects
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