.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
The 1787 inventory of clocks in Louis XVI's apartments at Versailles1 records the present vase-clock in the Cabinet des bains:
'Une pendule de cheminée à vase en porcelaine bleu, ornée de deux branches de lauriers qui entoure la lunette et de deux dauphins, terminée par un jet d'eau, h. de 14 po. sur 6 po. 9 l. de large, par Roque. - Cabinet des bains' (a mantelpiece clock in the shape of a vase in blue porcelain, decorated with two laurel branches surrounding the lunette and two dolphins, terminating with a water jet, height 14 pouces on 6 pouces, 9 [pouces] wide, [movement] by Roque. - bathroom).2
The precision of the description, which matches the present lot perfectly, confirms beyond any reasonable doubt that the present vase-clock was once in Louis XVI's bathroom at Versailles. The closest known surviving example of a vase pendule à dauphins is at Sèvres, Cité de la céramique, but this is decorated with oak leaves, not laurel, and the movement is by a different maker.3 Only one other example of this vase-clock, formerly in the Hector Binney Collection,4 is known to have survived. Both the Binney Collection example and the example at Sèvres were gilded by Le Guay, and unlike the present lot, both are undated.
It is not absolutely certain which 'Cabinet des bains' the vase-clock was in at the time the inventory was taken. It is possible that it could have been in the new bathroom which Louis XVI had installed next to the Cour des Cerfs in 1777. The delivery date of the clock to Versailles is unknown, but if it was delivered in the year of its manufacture, 1775, then Louis XVI's new bathroom would not have been installed by then. It is therefore very probable that the clock initially went to the last of Louis XV's five successive bathrooms at Versailles. Louis XV's last bathroom was installed between 1770 and 1774 on the previous site of the personal apartments of Madame Adelaide.5 The architect was Ange Jacques Gabriel, and the panelled walls are decorated with gilded low-relief panels and oval medallions depicting aquatic scenes.6 The corners of the panelling are decorated with dolphins which are very similar to those on this vase-clock.
Although the decorative elements of the dolphin vase-clock would have fitted perfectly with Louis XV's Cabinet des bains, the form was not designed specifically for that room as it had been developed earlier. The vase pendule à dauphins is an adaptation of the vase à dauphins,7 a form which is first mentioned in the Sèvres factory records from 1757. The form of the vase à dauphins certainly leant itself very well for use in this bathroom, and it is interesting that its conversion into a clock should date to a time before Louis XVI's new bathroom was installed in 1777, and after the completion of Louis XV's last bathroom in 1774. The vase pendule à dauphins form appears for the first time in the records for 1775, but in 1776 the vase pendule à dauphins form is mentioned 8 times in the 'Travaux extraordinaire' records.8
If the clock was initially in Louis XV's last bathroom, then it may have been moved in 1777 to Louis XVI's new bathroom, but it certainly couldn't have been moved much after that because in the summer of 1783 Louis XV's last bathroom was transformed into a Cabinet de la Cassette for administrative use.
The records at Sèvres for 1775 are not complete, and the present vase-clock is not recorded in the records that have survived. The 1775 date on the present lot, and the appearance of the Binney Collection vase pendule à dauphins in the records in 1775 suggests that these two vase-clocks are the first examples of their type. The similarity of the vase à dauphins form to the vase à jet d'eau suggests they could have been designed by the same person (both have dolphins spouting jets of water and upper parts formed as fountains), and it has been suggested that the latter was designed by Jean-Claude Chambellan Duplessis, père (c. 1695-1774), the directeur artistique.9 Gilt-bronze clocks of related form made in Paris are also known.10
1. The inventory is published by Pierre Verlet, Les Bronzes Dorés Français du XVIIIe siècle , 1987, p. 460, no. 12.
2. The sizes in pouces are the rough equivalent of inches. The 6 pouces height and 9 pouces width measurements must refer to a plinth base which is now lost. On the underside of the ormolu plinth foot of the vase-clock there are cut pins which once attached it to a further plinth. This could suggest that the pins were once glued into a porcelain plinth (if the plinth had been ormolu the pins would usually have been unscrewed). Alternatively the pins could have been cut to release the vase-clock from the plinth which was still attached to the vase-clock when it was sold in 1969. It is not certain if this plinth (which was mounted with rococo-style porcelain plaques) was original to the clock or 19th century, but it seems more probable that it was 19th century. This plinth is now lost.
3. The Sèvres Museum example is on a porcelain (rather than ormolu) foot, and is illustrated by Marcelle Brunet and Tamara Préaud, Sèvres, Des origines à nos jours, Fribourg, 1978, p. 202, no. 234. It is recorded in the painters' records on 5th February 1786 (Vl' 3 fo 1) and was delivered to M. Dubuisson on 6th May 1786 (Vy. 10 fo 39 vo).
4. Sold by Sotheby's London on 5 December 1989, lot 111. The Binney Collection vase-clock has no gilt leaf decoration and the dial is signed by Germain Dubois. The catalogue entry erroneously refers to two additional similar examples in the Victoria and Albert Museum and an example in the Metropolitan Museum, New York; these are vases (vase à dauphins), not clock-vases. The example in the Metropolitan Museum (inv. 58.75.67), is illustrated by C.C. Dauterman et al., Decorative Art From The Samuel H. Kress Collection At The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Aylesbury, 1964, pp. 214-215, no. 44, Figs. 162-163. The example in the V&A Museum is illustrated by William King et al., Catalogue of the Jones Collection, Part II, London, 1924, pl. 21, no. 145, and the other is illustrated by F.J.B. Watson, 'The Collections of Sir Alfred Beit: 2' (Furniture and Ceramics), in Connoisseur, CXLV, 1960, p. 222.
5. Louis XV had moved his personal apartments there in the late 1760s to compensate for the apartments he had recently given to Madame du Barry. For a full discussion of this bathroom see Christian Baulez, Versailles, deux siècles d'histoire de l'art, 2007, pp. 151-164.
6. After Louis XV's death from smallpox on 10th May 1774, the new King ordered that Louis XV's apartments should be thoroughly cleaned to ensure that anything which could have 'contracter le venin' (contracted the contagion) was decontaminated. Specific orders were given to clean the gilding of various rooms including the Chambre de bains, suggesting that it was still in use as a bathroom at the beginning of Louis XVI's reign.
7. The form is published by Albert Troude, Choix de Modèles de La Manufacture Nationale de Porcelaines de Sèvres, Paris, 1897, pl. 100, under the name 'vase oeuf anses dauphins'. Cf. the V&A and Metropolitan Museums examples cited in note 4 above, and the pair of vases from the Property of the late Kaufman T. Keller of Detroit sold in these Rooms on 30 October 1967, lot 43. The vase à dauphins was formerly regarded as having been designed to commemorate the birth of the Dauphin in 1781, see King, ibid., p. 19, no. 145.
8. In the 'Travaux extraordinaire' (the record of special commissions) for 1776, the vase pendule à dauphins is described in varying ways. Overtime payments were made to the Répairer Caron, who received 24 livres for: '1. V. Dauphan à pendule', and to the Répairer Bono, who is recorded in three separate entries as having received payments for: '1. Vase à pendule, Dauphin' at 24 livres each. Vautrain, the Tourneno, is also recorded as having received payment for: '6. Vase. E Dauphine à pendule' at 10 livres each, at a total cost of 60 livres (Cf. Série F, Carton F6, no. 35731.4 for all these references). It is possible that Caron and Bono could have been working on vase-clocks which were worked on by Vautrain, so it is difficult to be sure what number were made in 1776, but there were certainly a minimum of 6. Unfortunately there are no 'Travaux extraordinaire' records for 1775, where the present vase-clock would almost certainly have been recorded.
9. Pierre Ennès has also suggested it could have been designed by Falconet, see Rosalind Savill, The Wallace Collection, Catalogue of Sèvres Porcelain, London, 1988, p. 282, note 4. A pair of vases à jet d'eau in the Wallace Collection, London, are illustrated by Savill, ibid., pp. 281-286, Cat. no. C284-5. The form was first recorded in 1765 (possibly to commemorate the future Louis XVI becoming dauphin in 1765), and a design showing the basic outline (later inscribed Vase colonne) is still at Sèvres (R 1, l.3,d.4,f.15bis).
10. Cf. Hans Ottomeyer and Peter Pröschel, Vergoldete Bronzen, Die Bronzearbeiten des Spätbarock und Klassizismus, Munich, 1986, no. 3.13.3, where it is dated as circa 1775, and another was with Mallett, London, in 1980, see Apollo, May 1980, p. 8. A clock of related but different form with dolphins and a fountain top is illustrated by Tardy, La Pendule Française, Paris, 1964, Vol. II, p. 251.
'Une pendule de cheminée à vase en porcelaine bleu, ornée de deux branches de lauriers qui entoure la lunette et de deux dauphins, terminée par un jet d'eau, h. de 14 po. sur 6 po. 9 l. de large, par Roque. - Cabinet des bains' (a mantelpiece clock in the shape of a vase in blue porcelain, decorated with two laurel branches surrounding the lunette and two dolphins, terminating with a water jet, height 14 pouces on 6 pouces, 9 [pouces] wide, [movement] by Roque. - bathroom).
The precision of the description, which matches the present lot perfectly, confirms beyond any reasonable doubt that the present vase-clock was once in Louis XVI's bathroom at Versailles. The closest known surviving example of a vase pendule à dauphins is at Sèvres, Cité de la céramique, but this is decorated with oak leaves, not laurel, and the movement is by a different maker.
It is not absolutely certain which 'Cabinet des bains' the vase-clock was in at the time the inventory was taken. It is possible that it could have been in the new bathroom which Louis XVI had installed next to the Cour des Cerfs in 1777. The delivery date of the clock to Versailles is unknown, but if it was delivered in the year of its manufacture, 1775, then Louis XVI's new bathroom would not have been installed by then. It is therefore very probable that the clock initially went to the last of Louis XV's five successive bathrooms at Versailles. Louis XV's last bathroom was installed between 1770 and 1774 on the previous site of the personal apartments of Madame Adelaide.
Although the decorative elements of the dolphin vase-clock would have fitted perfectly with Louis XV's Cabinet des bains, the form was not designed specifically for that room as it had been developed earlier. The vase pendule à dauphins is an adaptation of the vase à dauphins,
If the clock was initially in Louis XV's last bathroom, then it may have been moved in 1777 to Louis XVI's new bathroom, but it certainly couldn't have been moved much after that because in the summer of 1783 Louis XV's last bathroom was transformed into a Cabinet de la Cassette for administrative use.
The records at Sèvres for 1775 are not complete, and the present vase-clock is not recorded in the records that have survived. The 1775 date on the present lot, and the appearance of the Binney Collection vase pendule à dauphins in the records in 1775 suggests that these two vase-clocks are the first examples of their type. The similarity of the vase à dauphins form to the vase à jet d'eau suggests they could have been designed by the same person (both have dolphins spouting jets of water and upper parts formed as fountains), and it has been suggested that the latter was designed by Jean-Claude Chambellan Duplessis, père (c. 1695-1774), the directeur artistique.
1. The inventory is published by Pierre Verlet, Les Bronzes Dorés Français du XVIII
2. The sizes in pouces are the rough equivalent of inches. The 6 pouces height and 9 pouces width measurements must refer to a plinth base which is now lost. On the underside of the ormolu plinth foot of the vase-clock there are cut pins which once attached it to a further plinth. This could suggest that the pins were once glued into a porcelain plinth (if the plinth had been ormolu the pins would usually have been unscrewed). Alternatively the pins could have been cut to release the vase-clock from the plinth which was still attached to the vase-clock when it was sold in 1969. It is not certain if this plinth (which was mounted with rococo-style porcelain plaques) was original to the clock or 19th century, but it seems more probable that it was 19th century. This plinth is now lost.
3. The Sèvres Museum example is on a porcelain (rather than ormolu) foot, and is illustrated by Marcelle Brunet and Tamara Préaud, Sèvres, Des origines à nos jours, Fribourg, 1978, p. 202, no. 234. It is recorded in the painters' records on 5th February 1786 (Vl' 3 f
4. Sold by Sotheby's London on 5 December 1989, lot 111. The Binney Collection vase-clock has no gilt leaf decoration and the dial is signed by Germain Dubois. The catalogue entry erroneously refers to two additional similar examples in the Victoria and Albert Museum and an example in the Metropolitan Museum, New York; these are vases (vase à dauphins), not clock-vases. The example in the Metropolitan Museum (inv. 58.75.67), is illustrated by C.C. Dauterman et al., Decorative Art From The Samuel H. Kress Collection At The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Aylesbury, 1964, pp. 214-215, no. 44, Figs. 162-163. The example in the V&A Museum is illustrated by William King et al., Catalogue of the Jones Collection, Part II, London, 1924, pl. 21, no. 145, and the other is illustrated by F.J.B. Watson, 'The Collections of Sir Alfred Beit: 2' (Furniture and Ceramics), in Connoisseur, CXLV, 1960, p. 222.
5. Louis XV had moved his personal apartments there in the late 1760s to compensate for the apartments he had recently given to Madame du Barry. For a full discussion of this bathroom see Christian Baulez, Versailles, deux siècles d'histoire de l'art, 2007, pp. 151-164.
6. After Louis XV's death from smallpox on 10th May 1774, the new King ordered that Louis XV's apartments should be thoroughly cleaned to ensure that anything which could have 'contracter le venin' (contracted the contagion) was decontaminated. Specific orders were given to clean the gilding of various rooms including the Chambre de bains, suggesting that it was still in use as a bathroom at the beginning of Louis XVI's reign.
7. The form is published by Albert Troude, Choix de Modèles de La Manufacture Nationale de Porcelaines de Sèvres, Paris, 1897, pl. 100, under the name 'vase oeuf anses dauphins'. Cf. the V&A and Metropolitan Museums examples cited in note 4 above, and the pair of vases from the Property of the late Kaufman T. Keller of Detroit sold in these Rooms on 30 October 1967, lot 43. The vase à dauphins was formerly regarded as having been designed to commemorate the birth of the Dauphin in 1781, see King, ibid., p. 19, no. 145.
8. In the 'Travaux extraordinaire' (the record of special commissions) for 1776, the vase pendule à dauphins is described in varying ways. Overtime payments were made to the Répairer Caron, who received 24 livres for: '1. V. Dauphan à pendule', and to the Répairer Bono, who is recorded in three separate entries as having received payments for: '1. Vase à pendule, Dauphin' at 24 livres each. Vautrain, the Tourneno, is also recorded as having received payment for: '6. Vase. E Dauphine à pendule' at 10 livres each, at a total cost of 60 livres (Cf. Série F, Carton F6, no. 35731.4 for all these references). It is possible that Caron and Bono could have been working on vase-clocks which were worked on by Vautrain, so it is difficult to be sure what number were made in 1776, but there were certainly a minimum of 6. Unfortunately there are no 'Travaux extraordinaire' records for 1775, where the present vase-clock would almost certainly have been recorded.
9. Pierre Ennès has also suggested it could have been designed by Falconet, see Rosalind Savill, The Wallace Collection, Catalogue of Sèvres Porcelain, London, 1988, p. 282, note 4. A pair of vases à jet d'eau in the Wallace Collection, London, are illustrated by Savill, ibid., pp. 281-286, Cat. no. C284-5. The form was first recorded in 1765 (possibly to commemorate the future Louis XVI becoming dauphin in 1765), and a design showing the basic outline (later inscribed Vase colonne) is still at Sèvres (R 1, l.3,d.4,f.15bis).
10. Cf. Hans Ottomeyer and Peter Pröschel, Vergoldete Bronzen, Die Bronzearbeiten des Spätbarock und Klassizismus, Munich, 1986, no. 3.13.3, where it is dated as circa 1775, and another was with Mallett, London, in 1980, see Apollo, May 1980, p. 8. A clock of related but different form with dolphins and a fountain top is illustrated by Tardy, La Pendule Française, Paris, 1964, Vol. II, p. 251.