Printed from Woolley & Wallis

Description

A Sèvres cheese cooler (fromager) date code for 1768, the cylindrical form painted by François-Joseph Aloncle with two panels of birds after George Edwards, reserved in gilt borders on a bleu celeste ground, the sides and base reticulated with small holes around a scroll design and central base flowerhead, gilt dentil rim, inscribed to the underside in black with 'grinperau D'amerique' (tree creeper) and 'Le lorio des Indes' (golden oriole), blue interlaced Ls marks enclosing date letter P above painter's mark, cracked, one handle a replacement, 15.6cm across.

Provenance: purchased from Errol Manners, 11th March 1992.

This fromager may have formed part of an ornithological service received by Louis-Charles-Auguste Le Tonnelier, baron de Breteuil on 16th April 1768, of which Aloncle is known to have decorated several key pieces. Two fromagers are listed as part of the original service, which was supplemented in 1771. Cf. David Peters, Sèvres Plates and Services of the 18th Century, Vol. II, pp.385-386, where this fromager is mentioned. Items from this service are believed to have been in the collection of Count A D Sheremetev, which was dispersed in London in 1906.