Allegory of the Arts

On a high rocky base, four cherubs surround the shaft of a fluted column. At the top of the composition, one of the cherubs is engaged in sculpting a bearded male bust; the other three each hold a different attribute. The impression of the mark featuring two crossed torches allows the attribution of the biscuit under examination to one of the oldest porcelain factories in Paris, namely the Locré factory, founded by Jean Baptiste Locré de Roissy in 1773 and also known as La Courtille after the Parisian district chosen as its headquarters on rue de la Fontaine-au-Roi. The founder himself had named his factory “manifacture de porcellaine allemande” (German porcelain manufactory) emphasizing its close stylistic resemblance to the production of Meissen, which constituted its main point of distinction.
The group presented here, of fine paste and pleasing design, is a typical product of La Courtille, a medium-sized factory specialized in the production of “figures en biscuits pour orner les salons et pour les desserts” (de Plinval de Guillebon 1972, 254).
The production of biscuit artifacts quickly became a central part in the manufactory’s activity, which was tireless in assimilating the most diverse suggestions from contemporary artistic culture. Within its ceramic production, biscuit figurines represent its highest expression; artists, most of whom are still unknown to us, produced highly poetic, playful, and even mischievous creations, competing—like all the other porcelain factories in Paris—with the perfection and elegance of Sèvres statuettes. The depiction of cherubs–whether as sprites, cupids, genies, or cherubim–belongs to a well-established iconographic tradition that, drawing inspiration from ancient Roman art and becoming widespread especially from the Renaissance onward, proliferated throughout the 17th century, adorning palaces and churches. The group in question effectively embodies the rocaille spirit: three cherubs are arranged around the base of a column, while a fourth genie works with a hammer and chisel on a bearded bust placed on a stone. The idea of a pyramidal composition of cherubs symbolizing the various arts or human activities is not entirely uncommon in porcelain of the last quarter of the eighteenth century. For instance, in The Mountain of Arts and Sciences, one of the largest groups of figures produced at the German factory in Höchst by master sculptor Johann Peter Melchior, the cherubs personify the allegories of Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Music, Geography, and Astronomy (Meister, Reber 1980, 166, fig. 287). 
Despite the reduction in the number of allegories, besides Sculpture, at least Astronomy with the globe can be clearly recognized here. Moreover, in 1777, the artistic direction of the La Courtille factory (as well as its ownership, ten years later) was entrusted to the renowned German modeler Laurent or Laurentius Russinger, who was already working as head of the sculpture workshop at the porcelain factory in Höchst, Germany, the first to produce groups of porcelain figures at the Locré manufactory. The modeler for the La Courtille manufactory thus demonstrated that analogous symbolic works were also being produced in Paris, albeit with a different plastic and atmospheric sensibility and a markedly different compositional clarity. The high quality of the material, combined with the excellence of execution and the careful rendering of details, make this group a typical product of this small but refined manufactory.

Giovanni De Girolamo

Entry published on 16 October 2025

Fair. Some cherubs are missing hands and attributes; traces of restoration carried out at an unknown date.

Two crossed torches and the letter “W” engraved in the paste, under the base.

Rome, Collezione Fabrizio Ruffo di Motta Bagnara, 1921;
Rome, Museo Nazionale di Palazzo Venezia, 1921.

Plinval de Guillebon Régine de, Porcelaine de Paris, 1770-1850, Fribourg 1972;
Meister Peter Wilhelm, Reber Horst, Europäisches Porzellan, Stuttgart 1980;
Casanova Maria Letizia, Le porcellane europee del Museo di Palazzo Venezia, Roma 2004, p. 212.