Sèvres sugar bowl and cover (part of a service)
date: label: date made
content: 1805
notes: label: Description
content: The sugar bowl and cover comes from a service that Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) gave to his sister Pauline (1780-1825) when she established a home in Paris at the hôtel de Charost. The light lilac ground was a fashionable color in post-revolutionary France, a time when interior designers experimented with new and unusual colors and color combinations, and one of the boudoirs in the hôtel de Charost was painted in a similar color. The figure subjects are painted in brown and highlighted in gold on a ground painted to imitate marble. On one side of the bowl the subject is the god Jupiter (the Greek god Zeus) who holds a thunderbolt in his right hand, and rides a chariot driven by two eagles. On the other side the subject is possibly Salacia, the Roman consort of Neptune (Poseidon in Greek mythology whose consort was Amphitrite). She is carried on a shell by two dolphins with cupids riding on their backs.
label: Description
content: The sugar bowl's light lilac ground has dark purple ornament painted in overglaze enamel. A Greek key pattern circles the bowl below the rim, and a foliate frieze circles the base of the bowl. On the cover a purple foliate pattern is punctuated by a gold floral medallion, and a palmette pattern circles the gold finial. The handles and foot of the bowl are heavily gilded.
label: Description
content: See Liana Paredes, 2009, exhibition catalog “Sèvres Then and Now: Tradition and Innovation in Porcelain, 1750-2000”, p.73, p.148.
label: Description
content: This sugar bowl belongs to the Alfred Duane Pell collection in the National Museum of American History. Before Pell (1864-1924) became an Episcopalian clergyman quite late in life, he and his wife Cornelia Livingstone Crosby Pell (1861-1938) travelled widely, and as they travelled they collected European porcelains, silver, and furniture. Pell came from a wealthy family and he purchased the large William Pickhardt Mansion on 5th Avenue and East 74th Street in which to display his vast collection. The Smithsonian was one of several institutions to receive substantial bequests from the Reverend Pell which laid the foundation for their collections of European applied arts.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: France: Île-de-France, Sevres
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Ceramics and Glass
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content: Industry & Manufacturing
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content: Art
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content: Domestic Furnishings
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: CE.P-778Cab
label: catalog number
content: P-778Cab
label: accession number
content: 225282
objectType: label: Object Name
content: bowl, sugar
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: red (overall color)
label: Physical Description
content: polychrome (overall surface decoration color name)
label: Physical Description
content: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 5 15/16 in x 5 9/16 in x 3 3/4 in; 15.08125 cm x 14.12875 cm x 9.525 cm