Porcelain

by Edward Dillon

M. Garnier dates the latest renaissance of European porcelain from the new ground struck out in the seventies, not only at Sèvres, by Deck and others, but also in many private kilns, as by Bracquemont in Paris and by Haviland in the Limoges district. What specially distinguishes the latest work is the advantage taken of the new colours that can now be employed with the grand feu so as to participate in the brilliancy and purity of the glaze. A delicacy of tone, a transparency and a harmony are now obtainable which contrasts favourably with the dry and dull colours of the old methods of painting. On the other hand, says M. Garnier, the progress in chemical knowledge has been so rapid that the new processes and colours have tended to become the masters of the artists who employ them, instead of remaining subtle tools in their hands.

This tendency is especially noticeable at Copenhagen, and the crystalline glazes, derived from bismuth, that have spread thence all over Europe, are a case in point. So again, starting from the flambé glaze of the Chinese, the modern potter is inclined to run riot with the numerous new materials at his command.

At Sèvres—I follow M. Garnier’s report—advantage has been taken of the new porcelain paste (that of the ‘milder’ Chinese type) to revive in the biscuit ware the reproductions of works of sculpture for which the factory was so renowned in the days of the pâte tendre. The pureness and softness of the material and the skill of the manipulation are noteworthy apart from the artistic merit of the work. (Let me here call attention to the fifteen figures by Léonard, ‘Le Jeu de l’Écharpe,’ in the new biscuit ware.) This revolution in the style of decoration has now spread to other parts of France, and has affected the great commercial factories of the south-west, especially the ware made by the firm of Haviland.

English porcelain was but poorly represented at Paris in 1900; besides, as we have said, it is in other branches of the potter’s art that we have to look for a reflection of our new native school of decoration. It is indeed a curious fact that many of the designs that we associate with Morris and his followers may be found rather upon the wares of Copenhagen and Sèvres than on our English porcelain. I cannot, however, pass over some criticisms of M. Garnier, in which he falls foul of certain tendencies in the fashioning and decoration of the wares turned out by our big Staffordshire firms. As to how far these criticisms are merited, any one may form an opinion for himself by a glance at the shop-windows of London. ‘The English paste,’ says M. Garnier, ‘is of a special nature which lends itself admirably both to the shaping and to the decoration; the execution is hors ligne, but this is accompanied by an overloading of detail, a heaviness in the decoration, and a want of harmony and proportion between the different parts of the piece that cause one to regret that so much talent and care have been employed only to arrive at so very unsatisfactory a result. Besides this, we notice in the English céramiste a want of sincerity, with the result that at first sight you cannot tell what manner of substance you are looking at, whether it is porcelain or dirty ivory, or again a gilt ceramic ware rather than a bronze with a poor patina.’ A curious point in connection with this criticism is that, if I am not mistaken, a good deal of the work thus severely dealt with has been designed, if not executed, by French artists. It is made, however, to satisfy the demand of our great unleavened middle-class.

Turning to the porcelain from the royal works at Charlottenburg, M. Garnier finds fault with the exuberance and overloading of the sculptures and reliefs. But certain large architectural pieces and some frames in rococo style, in pure white ware, excite his admiration, for the beauty of the paste, the purity and the limpidity of the glaze, and the marvellous way in which the technical difficulties of the execution have been surmounted; so, too, for the brilliancy of the colouring and the way in which the enamel colours combine with and form one material with the glaze, as if one were looking at a soft-paste ware. Above all, in some pieces of the ‘new porcelain’—for the milder paste is now in use at Berlin to some extent—the colours of the grand feu and the purity of the enamel are remarkable.

At Meissen, says M. Garnier, they are still working on the old lines: reproductions of the models made a century and a half ago by Kändler are as much as ever in demand. Certain ambitious attempts in a newer style have resulted in errors that will add nothing to the fame of the works. (Dr. Heintze, the present director, has especially devoted himself to the development of the new colours under the glaze. But the porcelain now produced, apart from the copies of the old wares, follows in the lines either of the Copenhagen porcelain, or again, at times, of the coloured pastes of Sèvres.)

Certain districts of Northern Bohemia have become of late centres of ceramic industry. The predominant bad taste and over-decoration of the porcelain made there (I still follow M. Garnier) is above all exemplified in certain coloured statuettes, ‘articles de bazar which corrupt the taste of the public and whose sale ought to be prohibited.’ An exception must be made for the produce of the Pirkenhausen works, near Carlsbad. The marvellous plasticity of the paste, made from the rich deposits of kaolin near Zottlitz, has been taken full advantage of, not only on the wheel and in the mould; it has allowed also of the free modelling of the superadded reliefs by the artist’s hand.

The factory at Herend, in Hungary, founded in 1839, no longer turns out the ware of Oriental style, so much admired by Brongniart, by Humboldt, and by Thiers. Herr Fischer, the director and principal artist, has lately made good imitations of the coloured pastes of Sèvres, with leaves and branches in relief.

At St. Petersburg the imitation of the over-decorated hard paste of Sèvres has been abandoned in favour of the soft and harmonious colours and the pure and limpid glazes of Copenhagen. The vases with designs of white paste, in relief upon coloured grounds, in a manner now little in favour at Sèvres, are less happy. At the Kousnetzoff factory, at Moscow, a polychrome decoration, in imitation of Byzantine embroideries and enamels, has been applied to tea-services of somewhat geometrical forms, while the French porcelain of the time of Louis Philippe continues to be imitated.

At Copenhagen, says M. Garnier, the new porcelain, which since its introduction in 1889 has been praised and exalted in all the art journals of Europe, is still produced on the same lines. Not to speak of the new and strange results already obtained from coloured and enamelled glazes, greater experience in the use of the extended palette at the command of the decorator has produced results in which we find an admirable delicacy and restraint. It was, however, from Sèvres that the impulse first came. We can trace it in the work turned out of late years by Messrs. Bing and Gröndhal. But in place of the amiable and gracious art of France we find here a severe, sometimes we might almost say a rude, style, but one not without character and elevation.