French 17th Century Nevers Bleu Persan Faience Jardiniere with à la bougie Decoration Circa 1660-80

French 17th Century Nevers Bleu Persan Faience Jardiniere with à la bougie Decoration
Circa 1660-80

The circular Nevers faience jardiniere has two large thick twisted rope handles.  The jardiniere with a Persian blue color and the exterior is painted à la bougie meaning white blotches like candle wax. The foot flared from a cinched  The interior is blue.  The body is slightly concave and narrows to a narrow base with a flared foot.  The base is unglazed and has three drainage holes.

Dimensions: 12 1/4 inches High x 19 1/2 inches Wide 

Faience jardinieres of the present type were used to contain small shrubs or fruit trees in the formal gardens of French chateaux. The prominent handles were both decorative and functional, enabling the easy movement of the pot and its often temperature-sensitive exotic fauna to alternate garden or conservatory locations. 

Reference: La Faience de Nevers, 1585-1900, Volume 2, Jean Rosen, Page 288, Fig. 466, for a group of Persian blue wares with  à la bougie decoration.  To the top right is an identical jardiniere.  The group of objects is dated 1660-80.

The Metropolitan Museum has a fragment of a handle, Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan, 1917, Accession Number: 17.194.2180, almost identical to this jardiniere, dating it 1670-80. (https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/194468)

The V & A Museum has a pair of similar Persian blue jardinieres with different feet and decorations (https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1156287/jardiniere-unknown/)-ACCESSION NUMBER 372A-1870.

The white splashed blue tin-glaze is characteristic of Nevers but rarely found on a piece of this scale, which is more usually decorated in blue on a pale blue ground in Chinese style. A flower pot of slightly different form, but of similar large scale, is in the collection of Burghley House, Stamford. (https://collections.burghley.co.uk/collection/a-nevers-jardiniere-circa-168090/).

(Ref: NY9974-pnmr)

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This object is eligible for a Certificate of BADA Provenance

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