soft-paste porcelain, overglaze dark blue ground color, polychrome enamel decoration, gilding
Description
This tall cylindrical vase with a lid has gilded decoration on blue ground and shows a harbor scene with men unloading parcels from aboard a ship on the front.
Henry Huntington acquired the Sèvres porcelain in this room shortly after Arabella Huntington’s death in 1924. The collection honors his wife’s passion for 18th-century French decorative arts. Innovative shapes, vibrant colors, rich gilding, and accomplished painting exemplify the products of the Royal Porcelain Manufactory at Sèvres, located just southwest of Paris. Many of these examples were designed by leading artists associated with the French court, such as the sculptor Etienne-Maurice Falconet and the porcelain painter Charles-Nicolas Dodin. The Huntington collection of Sèvres porcelain includes pieces representing both the fanciful and imaginative rococo style of the 1740s and ‘50s and the later more sober and precise neoclassical taste.