Drawing on Japan
Ceramics designed by the artist Félix Bracquemond pioneered the use of motifs drawn from Japanese art in 19th-century French decorative arts. Larry Simms publishes here two extraordinary overlooked porcelain services by Bracquemond that add greatly to our understanding of his career.
Larry Simms, Monday, 25th August 2008
Further, like the Service figures et accessoires japonais, the Service fleurs et oiseaux jetés is executed on an uncoloured white ground, with the exception of the vases, which usually have a ground colour of pink, celadon, grey, cream, or rose beige (Fig. 11).20 Similarly, the plates’ edges are left undecorated or have only a narrow decorative banding.
Perhaps one of the most noticeable differences between the Service fleurs et oiseaux jetés and both the Service Rousseau and the Service figures et accessoires japonais is the arrangement of the transfers, especially on the table plates (Fig. 12). Unlike the Service Rousseau table plate, which has a flowering plant inverted and floating above a rooster, and unlike the Service figures et accessoires japonais dessert plate, which has a hanging lantern below a seated geisha, the images in most of the pieces in the Service fleurs et oiseaux jetés are positioned with a greater attempt to bring together the separate motifs into a unified and rational whole. Standing birds or birds perched on flowering plants are placed on the lower area of the table plate to suggest the ground. Small flying birds, alone or in flocks, are positioned on the upper area of plates to give both a sense of sky and distance. Further, the last of the seven etchings for this service contains several images with moons, some with birds in flight, and these were also used on the upper areas of the plates to suggest a landscape with the sky above.
Pinpointing the date of the Service fleurs et oiseaux jetés is fairly straightforward. Like the Service figures et accessoires japonais, the Service fleurs et oiseaux jetés was illustrated in the 1879 Tarif des porcelaines et des faience de Haviland & Co.,21 but there is clear evidence that the set was introduced before 1879. A photograph made by the Centennial Photograph Company, part of their series of views of the large Haviland and Company display at the Philadelphia Fair in 1876, shows four Haviland porcelain covered tureens, two of which, those on the left, are from the Service fleurs et oiseaux jetés (Fig. 13).22 These two tureens were part of a 56-piece table service in this décor included in the large Haviland and Company booth.23
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