Saigon lidded vases

The acclaimed painter and sculptor Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse was artistic director at the Manufacture de Sèvres from 1875 to 1887, during one of its major periods of creativity and success, particularly at the universal expositions. From a technical point of view, a new paste, developed by the chemists Charles Lauth and Georges Vogt and still used today, was combined with the use of more efficient globe kilns, and forms and decoration were evolving. These two variations of the Saigon vase, designed in 1880, are typical of the contemporary European fascination for the Far East. Although both have the same Sèvres blue ground, they are stylistically very different, one classical with gilt filet and figures on the belly, the other modern with a scattering of Japanese-style flowers.