Potpourri Vase (Vase potpourri à vaisseau)

This exceptional vase, which rests on a gilded wooden base, takes the form of a stylized ship, complete with rigging, port-holes, and a long pennant or flag. At each side is a mask of a lion-like beast crowned with reeds and holding spars in its mouth. The form was likely the creation of Jean-Claude Duplessis, who was the chief designer for Sèvres and is noted for his sculptural designs. Duplessis may have been inspired to create this shape by the coat-of-arms of the city of Paris, which prominently features a sailing ship.

The lower part of the vase is decorated on the front with a scene within a cartouche of sailors working on a dock with a ship in the background and on the back with a marine-themed trophy composed of a shell, an anchor, seaweed, two oars, a flag, and a trident (three-pronged spear) all tied together with a ribbon. Both the front and back decoration are the work of Jean-Louis Morin, a leading painter at the Sèvres factory during this period, who specialized in such marine scenes. Few examples of this form were created and even fewer survive today. Other examples can be found in France’s Musée du Louvre; in England in the British Royal Collection, the Wallace Collection, and at Waddesdon Manor; and in the United States at the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Frick Collection, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Provenance

Provenance (from the French provenir, 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody, or location of a historical object. Learn more about provenance at the Walters.

Collection of Sir Anthony Nathan de Rothschild, 1st Baronet (1810–1876) [date and mode of acquisition unknown] [1]. Collection of Edwin Marriott Hodgkins (1860–1932), Paris, by 1927 [date and mode of acquisition unknown]; with A. Seligmann, Rey and Co., New York, by 1928 [date and mode of acquisition unknown]; purchased by Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1928; by bequest to the Walters Art Museum, 1931.

[1]. Provenance not confirmed, as given by Edwin Marriott Hodgkins: Catalogue of an Important Collection of Old Sèvres Porcelain, Louis XV and Louis XVI Period, Belonging to E.M. Hodgkins, Paris ([Paris?]: Edwin Marriott Hodgkins, 1927), number 30: “A Vase and Cover. Sèvres Porcelain. Pâte tendre. Shape known as ‘Vaisseau à mât’.... Formerly in the collection of Sir Anthony de Rothschild.”