Pair of vases
In the second half of the eighteenth-century, French designers sought ever rarer and more exotic materials for decorative objects. This pair of vases, of a granite called orbicular diorite found in both Corsica and the Ural mountains, may have been turned and polished either in Paris or St. Petersburg, where there was a luxury market for hard stone objects. They were then completed in Paris with gilt-bronze mounts including large handles in the form of rams' heads and finials with a knob of berries above acanthus leaves. Objects of this quality were much sought after by collectors and were sometimes especially commissioned by the Parisian dealers called "marchands merciers".
Artwork Details
- Title: Pair of vases
- Date: ca. 1780
- Culture: possibly Russian, St. Petersburg with French mounts
- Medium: Orbicular diorite, gilt bronze
- Dimensions: each: 24 × 16 in. (61 × 40.6 cm)
- Classification: Metalwork-Gilt Bronze
- Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. Charles Wrightsman, 1999
- Object Number: 1999.122.1, .2
- Curatorial Department: European Sculpture and Decorative Arts
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Unknown
probably shortly before 1704
Imperial Armory, Tula (south of Moscow), Russia
ca. 1780–85
Russian
1797
The Kremlin Armory Workshops, Moscow
Russian Painter
1637
Russian, Moscow
ca. 1780
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