Pair of urns with covers

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Although little is known of their provenance, these breche violette urns reflect the fashion for hardstone objects mounted in gilt bronze which were eagerly collected in France during the last decades of the eighteenth century. One of the best known collectors was Louis-Marie-Augustin, Duke d’Aumont (1709-82), who directed the Menus-Plaisirs et Affaires de la Chambre du Roi, an administrative body of the king’s household that managed the monarch’s personal effects and organized his entertainment, creating sets for theatrical productions and significant occasions such as marriages and funerals. At the Menus-Plaisirs, marble, granite and porphyry, jasper and agate, when possible acquired in Italy, were wrought into magnificent decorative objects frequently, mounted in gilt bronze by Pierre Gouthière (1732-1813/14). The Duke d’Aumont had urns of a similar shape in his collection that were sold off following his death. The gilt-bronze finials, collar decorated with guilloche motifs and rosettes, mask-shaped handles, and plinth beautifully enhance the colorful marble that ranges from deep purple to off white.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art