French
glazed porcelain vase clock - Details:
Price - Inquire.
This
rare French porcelain vase clock with applied Bisque
swags and garlands by Niederviller has white enameled
annular dials with Roman hour and Arabic minute markings.
The front and back are each decorated with different
glazed enamel scenes of castles, lakes, and mountains.
The
eight-day movement, which is visible by lifting the
ornate top, strikes a bell on the hour and half-hour.
The maker has engraved HR, surrounded by a diamond,
on the back plate.
The
movement has been recently cleaned and serviced by
Gerald Marsh in Winchester, England, and is in good
working order. There are no cracks or chips on the
porcelain and no evidence of repair. A similar clock
can be found on page 288, photo #6, of “La Pendule
Francaise” by Tardy.
Circa
1840
Dimensions:
14”(34cm) high, 5 1/2”(14cm) diameter
|
Click
images below to view large detailed photographs
of this vase clock.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
In
the mid-1700s, porcelain became so popular among the
nobility that aristocrats began sponsoring their own
manufactories. Jean-Louis Beyerlé, an advisor to the
king, founded one such operation at Niderviller in 1748,
developing it out of an earlier faience-making business.
The new enterprise initially drew its workers and stylistic
inspiration from a neighboring concern in Strasbourg,
which produced ceramic wares in the Rococo taste. At
Niderviller, the workers modified the bright Strasbourg
palette, making it softer.
Because
of its unique location in the duchy of Lorraine—where
it was exempt from French laws designed to protect
the royal monopoly of the Sèvres porcelain manufactory—Niderviller
flourished for nearly twenty years, unlike other French
porcelain manufactories. When the Duke of Lorraine
died in 1766, the territory reverted back to the French
crown, and the manufactory was then subject to new,
even tighter restrictions on production and decoration.
In 1772 Beyerlé sold the factory to a French count.
