While we must admire, from the economic point of view, the methods of
manufacture which have placed England in the first rank as a
pottery-producing country, inasmuch as they have brought within the
reach of the humblest domestic utensils of high finish and great
durability, it is impossible to say much for the taste or art associated
with them. Neatness, serviceableness and durability, English domestic
wares undoubtedly possess in a degree unknown to any earlier type of
pottery, but the general use of transfer-printing as the principal
method of decoration, and the absence of any distinctive style of
ornament, must cause them to take a low rank in comparison with the
wares of past centuries, when mechanical perfection was impossible and
rich colour and truly decorative painting were the chief distinctions of
the pottery of every country. The London International Exhibition of
1851 is generally supposed to indicate the low-water mark of art as
applied to industry; it should rather be regarded as marking the period
when many of the old handicrafts had been extinguished by the use of
mechanical appliances and the growth of the factory system, and when the
delight of men in these current developments was so great that they were
regarded as triumphs in themselves, when they were only "means to an
end."
Since that period the development of pottery and porcelain has followed
two main directions: (1) an attempt on the part of manufacturers to
produce the most artistic results possible with modern processes and
methods, and (2) the interesting and valuable efforts of those
individual potters in every country with whom art was the first
consideration and commercial production was disregarded.
Though the English pottery factories were of such paramount importance
in the first half of the 19th century, it must be remembered that some
of the oldest factories in Europe were still alive and active. The royal
factories in Sèvres, Meissen, Berlin, Vienna, St Petersburg and
elsewhere, surviving the wreck of the Napoleonic Wars, continued at the
expense of their respective states, to produce porcelains which were the
legitimate development of their work during the 18th century.
_Meissen and Berlin._--At Meissen, efforts were made to improve the
technical process in use, but, unfortunately, the old Meissen wares had
already become valuable, and they were reproduced, marks included, until
all initiative was destroyed, and the factory continued to live, mainly,
on its old reputation.
At Berlin, the financial troubles of the Prussian monarchy throughout
the early years of the 19th century were severely felt, so that a
cheaper class of porcelain was manufactured. The only innovations that
can be ascribed to the factory during this period, though highly
esteemed at the time, form striking examples of the artistic decadence
of the period. Such was the lace-work decoration made by dipping lace in
porcelain slip so that on firing the thread burned away, leaving a
porcelain facsimile; another was the production of slabs of porcelain
modelled in such a way that on viewing the piece by transmitted light it
appeared like a picture painted _en grisaille_.
From the artistic point of view there is little to be said for the
majority of productions of the Berlin factory, but nowhere in the world
has greater attention been paid to the technical and scientific problems
of porcelain manufacture, and this establishment has rendered the
greatest service in the development of the important chemical and
electrical industries of Germany by the splendid appliances it has
invented for scientific use.
Since 1870 the works, removed to Charlottenburg, have been conducted
with very great enterprise. It was here that Seger perfected his soft
porcelain based on the glazes and bodies of the best Japanese
porcelains, and here also he developed the manufacture of copper-red
glazes in imitation of the old _sang-de-boeuf_ and _flambé_, glazes of
the Chinese, at the same time establishing some of the scientific
principles underlying their production. At Berlin, too, all the modern
methods of decoration, whether in coloured glazes, raised enamels, _pâte
sur pâte_, the elaborate paintings of flowers, birds or figures, or the
use of crystalline glazes, have been followed with great success; but
the factory has never yet given any special impetus or new direction to
the decorative side of porcelain.
_Vienna._--Few European factories were so little affected by the general
trend of affairs as the royal factory at Vienna. We have already
referred to the elaborate paintings and rich gilding which became the
distinguishing feature of its wares towards the end of the 18th century,
and this style, once perfected, seems to have been continued with little
change. It has been stated by a renowned German authority, that the
Viennese porcelain was at its best between 1785 and 1815. During this
period the plan of painting copies of pictures on porcelain was
developed to its utmost, and this, in combination with the richest
gilding, marks the apotheosis of Viennese porcelain. The factory came to
an end in 1864, but collectors should be warned that a flood of cheap
porcelains, decorated in modern Viennese workshops, and therefore styled
"Viennese porcelain," has during the last twenty years overwhelmed the
English and American markets.
_Sèvres._--The important part played by the Royal French manufactory at
Sèvres has already been sketched. During the troublous years of the
French Revolution the works practically came to a standstill, and under
the Directory it was a question whether this manufactory, along with
certain other state establishments in France, should be closed.
Napoleon, however, decided that for the glory of France and as a means
of encouraging its porcelain industry, seriously threatened by the
English potters, the establishment at Sèvres should be conducted as a
national factory. By a splendid coincidence Alexander Brongniart, a man
of great natural ability, and a noted scientist, was appointed director,
and retained that post under the successive governments of France until
his death in 1847. In the hands of Brongniart the establishment at
Sèvres became at once a school of research and a centre of practical
accomplishment--the influence of which was felt throughout Europe. Its
products were obviously inspired by the demands of successive French
monarchs and their courts. It ministered to the grandiose ideas of
Napoleon, who demanded pieces that were to speak of his victories, and
after every campaign a fresh table service or new suite of vases was
produced to commemorate the emperor's successes. The most striking piece
of this kind was the vase made to commemorate the marriage of Napoleon
and Marie Louise in 1810. It was designed by Isabey and was modelled
with figures in bas-relief. The principal group contains not less than
115 such figures, while the subsidiary group, representing the
acclaiming populace, contains between 2000 and 3000 figures. This vase
was three years in making, and is said to have cost something like
£1250. Unfortunately this was not a solitary example of the productions
of Sèvres, for under every successive government of the 19th century the
factory has been called to produce enormous vases which are to be found
in the rooms or corridors of every palace and museum in France, and
while these pieces represent wonderful technical skill, both in their
manufacture and the decorations with which they are covered, very few of
them possess either spontaneity or charm. They are correct, frigid,
cold, and compare most unfavourably from the artistic point of view
with the masterpieces of oriental pottery.
Everything was carried out on the grand scale, and once again the
influence of Sèvres became paramount in Europe, and its styles of
painting and decoration were eagerly followed from 1830 to 1870 by all
those European potters who were attempting to make anything beyond
useful domestic wares. As an instance of its aims in the period between
1830 and 1850, large sums were spent in the production of great slabs of
porcelain many feet in area; on which were painted copies of some of the
famous portraits and other pictorial masterpieces in the galleries of
the Louvre. A number of these are preserved in the museum at Sèvres, and
must always excite admiration and even wonder at their technical
accomplishment.
The most noticeable invention of Sèvres in the middle part of the 19th
century was the _pâte sur pâte_ decoration in which porcelain clays of
various colours are used as the artist's medium. The idea appears to
have been adopted from an old Chinese vase by Robert, the chief painter,
and at the London International Exhibition of 1862 some small cups
decorated in this method, by Gely, were first shown. The most successful
work in this style was, however, that produced by M. Solon, who worked
at Sèvres until 1870. In that year he came to England and was employed
at Minton's, where for about thirty-five years he continued this method
of work, one of the few artistic and beautiful styles of pottery
decoration of the 19th century. As practised by M. Solon the _pâte sur
pâte_ decoration took the form of paintings of figure subjects or dainty
ornamental designs in white slip on a coloured porcelain ground of
green, blue, dark-grey or black. On such grounds a thin wash of the slip
gives a translucent film, so that by washing on or building up
successive layers of slip, sharpening the drawing with modelling tools,
or softening or rounding the figure with a wet brush, the most delicate
gradations of tint can be obtained, from the brilliant white of the slip
to the full depth of the ground. This method was rapidly adopted by all
the principal European factories, though nowhere was it carried to such
perfection as at Sèvres and at Minton's. M. Taxile Doat has executed
many extraordinary pieces in this style of decoration at Sèvres, and in
the British Museum there is a large vase of his, presented by the French
government at the beginning of the present century. One great feature of
French porcelain manufacture during the 19th century was the development
of the industry at Limoges and the neighbouring district of central
France. Limoges was a small centre of porcelain production in the period
between 1780 and 1850, but after the latter date it rapidly developed
into a pottery centre second only in importance to that of the Potteries
district in England. We can do no more than mention this fact, because,
for the most part, the activities of Limoges have been devoted to the
production of pottery commercially, rather than pottery as an art.
The Franco-German War proved a disaster for Sèvres, and all work came to
a standstill for a time. The existing manufactory, which was almost
completed before the outbreak of the war, was opened by Marshal MacMahon
in 1876, but for many years the work was continued under great
discouragement. Between 1879 and 1889 attention was paid to the study
and imitation of old Chinese methods, and this resulted in the
reproduction of many of those Chinese glazes which had hitherto been the
despair of European potters.
At the Paris Exhibition of 1900 the display made by Sèvres was perhaps
the most notable feature of the magnificent collection of ceramics
gathered there. The collection included many varieties of porcelain,
both hard and soft paste, decorated in all the current styles of the
period; under-glaze painting, on-glaze painting, flambé glazes and
crystalline glazes, but most beautiful of all were the magnificent
groups of "biscuit" figures designed as table garnitures by some of the
best French sculptors of the time.
_English Progress._--The demand for elaborate specimens of painted
porcelain was at its height throughout Europe between 1851 and 1880, and
this demand was undoubtedly fostered by the series of international
exhibitions held during that period, when every European pottery works
of note produced large and costly specimens of porcelain or earthenware,
smothered with painting and gilding. Every famous manufactory produced
something beyond the ordinary, but undoubtedly the first of European
factories during this period was that of Messrs Minton at
Stoke-upon-Trent. M. Leon Arnoux, a descendant of the Arnoux's of Apt,
an old family of French potters, was at this time the technical and
artistic director of Messrs Minton's works, and he was the only pottery
director during the 19th century who could in any sense be compared with
M. Brongniart of Sèvres. M. Arnoux combined in a remarkable degree
artistic with technical skill, and under his management the works of
Messrs Minton became the greatest centre of ceramic art in Europe.
Skilful modellers, like Jeannest, Carriere-Belleuse, and Protat, and
pottery painters such as A. Boullemier, Moussill, E. Lessore and L.
Solon were engaged at this factory and produced many of the most
characteristic European decorations of the middle of the 19th century.
To this period, too, we must refer another English invention, that of a
special porcelain known as "Parian." This in its finest expression was a
"biscuit" porcelain used for the production of statuettes and groups
rivalling the finest 18th century "biscuit" figures of Sèvres and Derby.
It seems probable that this Parian was first made at the works of
Copeland and Garratt, at Stoke-upon-Trent; but it was immediately
adopted at Minton's, Wedgwood's, and at Worcester; and each of these
firms used it in a distinctive way. Glazed Parian was also manufactured
at the Belleek Porcelain Works in Ireland (the only Irish porcelain
works of any note), and later its manufacture was developed by the
Worcester Royal Porcelain Company, Moore Brothers of Longton, and other
English manufacturers until it became an important branch of the English
porcelain made in the period under review.
_Japanese Influence._--At the Paris Exhibition of 1867 the great
collection of the applied arts of Japan took Europe by storm, and there
was an immediate outbreak of adaptations of Japanese art in Europe once
more; not as in the 18th century, when the old Japanese patterns were
copied or frankly imitated, but a European-Japanese style arose, based
on the methods and ideas of the great Japanese painters and draughtsmen,
the workers in metal, in iron, in lacquer and in silk. In England the
Worcester Royal Porcelain Company produced a series of elaborate and
skilful pieces inspired from this source, which for perfect and minute
execution must be ranked before all other European works of their kind.
The most admirable result of this revived interest in Japanese art was,
however, developed at the Royal Copenhagen works, the productions of
which are not only famous all over the world, but have set a new style
in porcelain decoration which is being followed at most of the
continental factories. By the use of the pure Swedish felspar and quartz
and the finest china clays from Germany or Cornwall a material of
excellent quality is prepared, and on this naturalistic paintings of
birds, fishes, animals and water or northern landscapes and figure
subjects are painted in delicate under-glaze blues, greys and greens.
The Royal Copenhagen works has also produced a profusion of skilfully
modelled animals, birds and fishes, either in pure white, or delicately
tinted after nature, with the same under-glaze colours.
Not only have Berlin, Sèvres and other European factories adopted the
modern Copenhagen style of decoration, but the Japanese are now
imitating these skilful productions which were originally inspired by
their own early work.
_Stonewares._--Mention must be made of the revival of the manufacture of
artistic stonewares by Doultons of Lambeth, and Villeroy and Boch, the
great German potters. Doultons, besides reviving the older forms of
English stoneware, made some entirely new departures, and their pieces
with designs etched in the clay are admirable examples of the right use
of a refractory material. Villeroy and Boch reproduced the old Rhenish
stonewares, and many interesting new departures in addition, but mostly
in German forms that have not commended the wares to other nations.
[Illustration: PLATE X.
Chelsea porcelain; 1745-1770 Figure after Watteau.
Worcester Porcelain; c. 1760-1770.
Whieldon and Wedgwood, cauliflower ware; c. 1750-1760.
Wedgwood's jasper; c. 1780.