Exoticism in the Decorative Arts (from chinoiserie to art deco).

European interest in non-Western art was first stimulated by trade with the East in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. By the nineteenth century, with the advent of the railroad and steamship, lands that were little known to Westerners became easier to access. As more Europeans traveled beyond the established routes of the Grand Tour, their experiences abroad began to influence their tastes at home. Other influences were a result of England's massive imperial control over lands in China, India, Africa, and the Pacific. By mid-century, many non-Western forms and ornamental motifs had found their way into the vocabulary of European decorative arts.

Like Orientalist subjects in nineteenth-century painting, exoticism in the decorative arts and interior decoration was associated with fantasies of opulence and "barbaric splendour," in the words of the English explorer, linguist, and writer, Sir Richard F. Burton (1821–1890). The arts of the East were also considered quaint and uncorrupted by industrial capitalism. While English critics complained about the lack of integrity and poor design in the utilitarian goods that were being produced in their factories, they exalted the arts of preindustrialized nations and held them in great esteem as supreme examples of good design. Because of their purity of design, Islamic ceramics, Indian textiles, and Japanese prints were considered aesthetically superior to European goods, which aimed for commercial novelty. Ironically, the introduction of non-Western motifs into the European design vocabulary was equally novel and became an alternative to the historically based designs associated with various revivalist styles in the nineteenth century.

Not only were non-Western societies thought of as being untainted by industry and capitalism, they were also perceived as morally superior and more devout than their European counterparts. Owen Jones (1809–1874) described objects from India that were considered exemplars of good design as "the works of a people who are still faithful to their art as to their religion, habits and modes of thought which inspired it. … We find no struggle after an effect; every ornament arises quietly and naturally from the object decorated, inspired by some true feeling, or embellishing some real want." In an attempt to provide principles of design along with an encyclopedic compilation of design motifs, Jones published the Grammar of Ornament in 1856. However, rather than appreciating non-Western design for its sense of "otherness," he analyzes it based on stylistic merits alone, stripping away its cultural context.

The fascination for exotic styles was fueled by significant displays of non-Western art at many of the international exhibitions from 1851 onward. Publications of archaeological finds and collections also fed the nineteenth-century passion for the exotic. For example, the Egyptian style, popularized following Napoleon's campaign in Egypt in 1798, was promoted throughout the nineteenth century by such publications as Vivant Denon's Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Égypte (1802) (26.168.77) and Thomas Hope's Household Furniture and Interior Decoration (1807). John Gardner Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians (1837), which illustrated domestic furniture found at Thebes, continued to influence the style of chairs and other furniture made by artist-designers through the 1880s.

Non-Western designs influenced ornament, form, materials, and techniques. The complexities of geometric design associated with Islamic decorative arts and architecture became a source of inspiration. Jones, a proponent of Islamic design, stressed the visual importance of stylizing forms inspired by nature. The motifs and luster glazes of Turkish ceramics influenced English (23.163.2ab), French (1985.225), and Hungarian ceramics, while North African architecture and materials inspired the furniture of Carlo Bugatti (1856–1940) in Italy (69.69). Persian decorative arts were a frequent source for the enamelwork of the French jewelry firm Falize (2002.258) as well as for Christopher Dresser (1834–1904) in England (1996.94). Looking to the Americas, Dresser also took inspiration from Precolumbian artifacts (1988.30).

Throughout the nineteenth century, the arts of China and Japan were an inexhaustible source for design ideas. Chinoiserie, a pseudo-Chinese decorative style popularized by Europeans in the 1730s, reappeared during the Regency and continued into the nineteenth century (69.193.1-.11). However, by the 1880s, Europeans—such as the Austrian chemist A. Bünzli and the French potter Joseph-Théodore Deck (1985.225)—were producing ceramic glazes stained with metallic oxides in imitation of the Chinese sang de boeuf (ox-blood) glaze. Copper-oxide could produce other colors such as variant shades of green, blue, and violet, which were labeled flambé (2003.280). Chinese stoneware with incised decoration also influenced artist-potters in France at the end of the century (23.31.1).

Following the opening of Japan to trade with the West in 1854, the influence of Japanese arts resonated in nearly all media. The simplicity of Japanese craft, design, and construction found favor among the Gothic revivalists—the architect William Burges called the Japanese display at the International Exhibition of 1862 the "true medieval court"—and the abstract and asymmetrical approach of Japanese design greatly affected the Aesthetic movement. Japanese prints influenced porcelain designs (1996.161.1-3), and Japanese fans, parasols, and blue-and-white porcelain became de rigueur accessories for the fashionable interior. Following his extensive travels in Japan in 1877, Christopher Dresser drew upon Japanese design in his work. He also imported Japanese goods to England, as did the merchant Arthur Lasenby Liberty (1843–1917) in London, and the art dealer Siegfried Bing (1838–1905) in Paris. Even Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera of 1885 The Mikado (with costumes supplied by Liberty's), capitalized on the West's fascination with Japan.

By the end of the century, the exotic, as appropriated by the West, had become a mass-produced commodity in itself; exotic images were used to sell everything from cigarettes to candy. However, the exotic continued to influence the appearance of the decorative arts as it fused with the organic whiplash curves of the avant-garde style known as Art Nouveau.


text source : The Metropolitan museum of Art

A small history of German and Austrian Porcelain in the Eighteenth Century

Chinese and Japanese porcelains were highly esteemed in seventeenth-century Europe, and although they were imported in ever-increasing quantities throughout the century, Europeans did not know the ingredients necessary for the production of true porcelain, commonly known as hard-paste porcelain. However, in 1709 an alchemist named Johann Friedrich Böttger discovered the materials required to produce a white, translucent, high-fired porcelain body, and this discovery was to have profound consequences for the entire European ceramic industry.

Böttger's experiments with the formula for porcelain included the development of a high-fired red stoneware, which led to several technological advances ultimately resulting in porcelain. This so-called Böttger stoneware was used both for wares and for figures, including one depicting Augustus the Strong, elector of Saxony (1982.60.318). Augustus had provided the impetus for Böttger's experiments and, based on the latter's success, he established a factory at Meissen, just outside Dresden, in 1710. The factory was soon producing a creamy white porcelain now known as Böttger porcelain (42.205.26), becoming the first European manufactory of hard-paste porcelain. In the 1720s, the Meissen factory developed a new and extensive range of enamel colors, and the factory's painters excelled in chinoiserie scenes. Fanciful depictions of life in an imagined and exotic Far East, chinoiseries were the most popular type of decoration during this decade (1974.356.488). One of the great achievements of the Meissen factory was the production of large-scale vases, which were difficult to fire successfully because of their size. Many of these vases were decorated with ground colors in imitation of Chinese porcelains, and chinoiserie scenes continued to be in vogue through the 1730s (1974.356.363). Frequently these vases are marked on the underside with the initials AR—for Augustus Rex—and it is likely that these objects were intended for Augustus' use or to be given as royal gifts.

The most ambitious of all of the projects undertaken at Meissen for Augustus the Strong was the production of large-scale animals for the Japanese Palace, the building intended to house all of his porcelain collections. The size of these animals presented enormous technical difficulties, and even though the factory used a more resilient hard-paste porcelain body for the animals, many of them display fire cracks and other evidence of problems encountered during firing. Nevertheless, they represent a remarkable achievement and remain among the most significant of all porcelain sculpture (1988.294.1).

The second factory in Europe to produce hard-paste porcelain was that founded in Vienna by Claudius du Paquier (died 1751). Du Paquier was assisted by the former kiln master from Meissen, and the new enterprise was able to make hard paste by about 1719. The du Paquier porcelain body was quite similar to that produced at Meissen, but the forms and styles of decoration employed at the Viennese factory were entirely original. The decoration on one du Paquier flower vase seems to depict du Paquier himself, seated near a group of porcelain objects, and the painted inscription calls attention to Vienna's accomplishment in producing porcelain (54.147.94). The concept of a dinner service with matching components was still novel in the 1730s, and the first dinner service to be made in porcelain was ordered from Meissen in late 1731. Du Paquier produced a partial dinner service, possibly composed exclusively of tureens, as early as the mid-1720s, and in the years 1736–40 made another service—composed primarily of tureens and wine coolers—that Emperor Charles VI gave to the Russian empress Anna Ioannovna (1982.60.330).

The success of the Meissen and du Paquier firms led to the establishment of other porcelain factories in Germany in the 1740s and 50s, and it was often workers coming from either Meissen or Vienna who provided the necessary technical expertise to the new operations. The factory established at Höchst in the mid-1740s began production on a viable scale only after the arrival of J. J. Ringler from the du Paquier factory. The Höchst factory employed a number of highly competent modelers, and the factory excelled in the production of figures. One of the most ambitious of these is The Audience of the Chinese Emperor (50.211.217), which was modeled by Johann Peter Melchior, director of the sculpture workshop beginning in 1767. This group probably decorated the table during the dessert course, accompanied by additional single figures also in a chinoiserie style.

Perhaps the most popular subjects for figures and groups were characters from the Italian commedia dell'arte. Porcelain figures depicting Harlequin, Columbine, Mezzetin, Isabella, and numerous others would have been instantly identifiable because of their costumes, for the traveling troupes of Italian commedia players had made these characters very familiar to eighteenth-century audiences. One of the greatest modelers of these figures was Franz Anton Bustelli, who worked at the Nymphenburg factory from 1754 until 1763. His figures (1974.356.524,.525) always display a pronounced elegance and a slight exaggeration of pose that simultaneously reflects some essential aspect of the character's personality.


text source : The Metropolitan museum of Art

to show

If it is about the gaps in between + how to fill them

The word history comes from the root *weid-, "to know, to see".^[8] This root is also present in the English words wit, wise, wisdom, vision, and idea, in the Sanskrit word veda,^[9]

The Ancient Greek word ἱστορία, historía, means "inquiry, knowledge acquired by investigation".

It was in that sense that Aristotle used the word in his Περὶ Τὰ Ζῷα Ἱστορίαι, Peri Ta Zoa Ηistoriai or, in Latinized form, Historia Animalium.^[11] The term is derived from ἵστωρ, hístōr meaning wise man, witness, or judge. We can see early attestations of ἵστωρ in Homeric Hymns, Heraclitus, the Athenian ephebes' oath, and in Boiotic inscriptions (in a legal sense, either "judge" or "witness", or similar). The spirant is problematic, and not present in cognate Greek εἴδομαι - eídomai ("to appear"). The form ἱστορεῖν - historeîn, "to inquire", is an Ionic derivation, which spread first in Classical Greece and ultimately over all of Hellenistic civilization.

It was still in the Greek sense that Francis Bacon used the term in the late 16th century, when he wrote about "Natural History". For him, historia was "the knowledge of objects determined by space and time", that sort of knowledge provided by memory (while science was provided by reason, and poetry was provided by fantasy).

The word entered the English language in 1390 with the meaning of "relation of incidents, story". In Middle English, the meaning was "story" in general. The restriction to the meaning "record of past events" arises in the late 15th century. In German, French, and most Germanic and Romance languages, the same word is still used to mean both "history" and "story". The adjective historical is attested from 1661, and historic from 1669.^[12]

Historian in the sense of a "researcher of history" is attested from 1531. In all European languages, the substantive "history" is still used to mean both "what happened with men", and "the scholarly study of the happened", the latter sense sometimes distinguished with a capital letter, "History", or the word historiography.^[11]

Historiography is the history of history, the aspect of history and of semiotics that considers how knowledge of the past, either recent or distant, is obtained and transmitted.^[1] Formally, historiography examines the writing of history, the use of historical methods, drawing upon authorship, sources, interpretation, style, bias, and the reader; moreover, historiography also denotes a body of historical work.

Beginning in the nineteenth century, at the ascent of academic history, a corpus of historiography literature developed, including What is History? (1961), by E. H. Carr, and Metahistory (1973), by Hayden White.

text source : http://en.wikipedia.org/

Franz Anton Bustelli (sculptor contributing to industry part 02)

Franz Anton Bustelli (April 12, 1723 — April 18 1763) was a Swiss-born German modeller for the Bavarian Nymphenburg Porcelain Factory from 1754 to his death in 1763.
He is widely regarded as the finest modeller of porcelain in the Rococo style: "if the art of European porcelain finds its most perfect expression in the rococo style, so the style finds its most perfect expression in the work of Bustelli".^[2]

He was born in Locarno in Italian-speaking Switzerland, and died in Munich, Bavaria, just after his 40th birthday.

Few details of his life are known, but he trained as a sculptor, probably mostly in wood,^[3] and perhaps in Italy.

The sculptor was employed at Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg on 3 November 1754 as a figure-maker – just shortly after Joseph Jakob Ringler succeeded in making porcelain. Within just a brief period, he became model master at the manufactory and helped it achieve world fame with his elaborate rococo designs. Bustelli remained with Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg until his death in 1763 and, after just nine years, left around 150 new designs.

Bustelli is the outstanding figure of Rococo porcelain, and his best work has a unique grace, energy, drama and often wit. His figures are thoroughly designed in the round, meant to be appreciated from all angles. The bases are unusually thin, and often include scroll-work that integrates elegantly with the figures. Some subjects are drawn from engravings, and many seem to show the influence of the conventional theatrical gestures of the period.^[10]

He was not very highly paid, and his possessions at his death included furniture and personal effects, some of his own figures, 228 engravings, and 31 books on chemistry.^[11]


above: Liebesgruppe, 1760, 14.4 cm

below: Painter's Notes, Nymphenburg services



























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text source : http://en.wikipedia.org/
image 01 source: http://www.swansea.gov.uk/
image 02 source : http://www.nymphenburg.com/

If it is about the gaps in between.... then editing is crucial

The wikipedia of 1764, the apotheosis of Homer and some gaps

John Flaxman (6 July 1755 – 7 December 1826), English sculptor and draughtsman

Flaxman re-interpreted a red figure design which appeared as a decoration on a calyx krater vase, purchased by the British Museum in London from Sir William Hamilton. This original vase was one of the ancient so-called Etruscan vases amassed by Sir William Hamilton when he was resident in Italy. The calyx krater vase is featured in the four-volume work compiled by d'Hancarville entitled Antiquities, Etrusques Grecques, et Romaines (published 1766-67), Volume III, plate 31.

Wedgwood referred to Flaxman's relief model in a letter to his Ornamental Ware partner Thomas Bentley, dated 19 August 1778. Bentley had already interpreted the scene as: '....some honor paid to the genius of Homer'.

Eight years later the bas relief was chosen by Josiah Wedgwood as the principal ornament for his most important jasper vase to date, sometimes known as the Pegasus Vase. The first copy of the vase was produced in February 1786. In May of the same year Wedgwood presented a copy of it to the British Museum, saying of it: '...it is the finest and most perfect I have ever made.'

Various examples of the vase exist in a number of collections. The one on display in the Wedgwood museum is made of white jasper, which has received a mid-blue dip, with white bas-relief figures. A superb specimen of the same subject, in a greenish-buff jasper dip, with the Pegasus or winged-horse finial in white, on solid pale blue jasper clouds, is retained by the Castle Museum, Nottingham.

During the 19th century examples of the vase appeared in black basalt. Subsequently smaller-size versions of the vase were issued by Wedgwood in jasper (of varying colours, usually with white bas reliefs) and in more recent times in black with the raised bas-relief ornamentation enhanced by the addition of exquisite gilding. This form of decoration has its source in the latter decades of the 19th century, when exquisite ornamental wares were made in black basalt with the bas-relief figures enhanced by bronzing and gilding.

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text and image source : http://www.wedgwoodmuseum.org.uk/
secondary source :http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/