Tray [1 of 2]

Trays of this model were designed to be mounted into a type of small work table, known as a table en chiffonière, intended for women to keep sewing and writing equipment. The shape was one of the first designed at Sèvres specifically to be mounted in furniture. The slightly larger tray with the lobed corners (27.56) would have been set into the top of the table. The smaller tray with the indented corners (27.78) would have been set as a lower shelf, with the indented corners fitting between the four table legs. The model was introduced in 1757 and described initially as plateau Courteille in 1758; from 1761 the title plateau de chiffonière was also used. This is the earliest known pair in this shape. A single example of a top tray model also with a pink ground and marked with the date letter E is at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Both trays are decorated with an overglaze pink (rose) ground color with an oval white reserve in the center of each painted in polychrome. The reserves are edged with a gilt pattern of floral vines. Further gilt floral vines outline the edges of the trays, which have scalloped designs in the corners. Although worn in areas, the gilding is tooled giving definition to the flowers, petals, leaves, and vines. Carmine enamel was added after the gilding and is used to enhance the gilded designs. The carmine is used not simply as an outline to the gilding, as will be seen on later examples, but to highlight and give depth and shading to the gilt patterns. It has even been applied on top of the gilding in some areas to further delineate floral detail, separate individual flowers, and indicate veins on leaves and vines.
The reserve on the top tray (27.56), painted by André-Vincent Vielliard, represents a boy painting the portrait of a girl and was probably meant as or inspired by an allegory of painting. The same scene, attributed to Vielliard, is painted on another plateau Courteille with a pink ground of 1757 at the Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford. Such an image of children engaged in adult occupations was almost certainly influenced by the earlier work of the painters François Boucher (1703-1770) and Carle Vanloo (1705-1765). For a discussion of this theme, see the essay by Jeffrey Weaver in this volume.
The reserve on the shelf tray (27.78), also by Vielliard, depicts a cloud with two billing doves, a torch suspending a wreath, a shepherd's crook with an open crown, a quiver, two hearts pierced with an arrow against a shield or cartouche, and an open manuscript with the title ACREO at the top of the left page. The title probably refers to Rameau's ballet Anacreon of 1754. A similar trophy was painted by Jean-Louis Morin on the side of a cuvette à tombeau also with a pink ground of 1757 at the Wallace Collection, London.
Pink had been introduced as a ground color only the year before these trays were produced and a consistent color was yet to be achieved. The tone of the pink varies greatly among different sets of pieces. Although recorded as being in use until the late 1780s, it is found mostly on pieces dating between 1757 and the early 1760s; rarely on pieces from the 1770s and later. The depth and intensity of the pink on this pair of trays has led to speculation that the decoration of the trays may be of later date. However, each tray has incised marks consistent with other examples made at this date and indicating that the bodies are of eighteenth-century Sèvres porcelain. The quality of the painting in the reserves is consistent with other documented works by Vielliard, and, most telling, the sophisticated gilded decoration with carmine highlights indicates that the decoration on the trays is original.