Louis-Simon BOIZOT (1743–1809) - Lot 200

Louis-Simon BOIZOT (1743–1809) Anacreon Served by Cupid and Cypris. Hard-paste biscuit porcelain group on a circular base, with the title inscribed on the base. Shows signs of damage and restoration. Manufacture Nationale de Sèvres, circa 1802. Features an incised "Sèvres" mark; an incised "A. B. 11.11.11" mark—attributed either to the sculptor and mold-preparer Alexandre Brachard (1775–1843) or representing a validation mark by Alexandre Brongniart; the sculptor’s signature "Boizot . Inv(eni)t. F(eci)t. AII.II. 3"; and an illegible red stamped mark on the reverse. H. 40 cm. Provenance: This group was created in 1801 by Louis-Simon Boizot, then director of the manufactory’s sculpture workshops. It serves as a pendant to another group, *Ovid Consoled by Cupid and Hope*, also created by Boizot in 1789. Among the various examples produced by the Sèvres manufactory around 1802, one—part of a *surtout de table* (table centerpiece)—was delivered to the Château de Fontainebleau; alternatively, it may have been an example produced later, during the July Monarchy. Listed in the 1848 inventory of the Château de Fontainebleau—compiled immediately following the July Monarchy—among seventeen other biscuit porcelain groups and figures, it was returned to King Louis-Philippe in 1848, alongside certain "Crown Jewels," and accompanied him into exile. Literature - *Les Sèvres de Fontainebleau, Pièces entrées de 1804 à 1904* [Sèvres at Fontainebleau: Pieces Acquired Between 1804 and 1904], catalogue of the furniture collections, vol. 2, Musée National du Château, edited by Bernard Chevallier, Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1996, page 15. - *The Sèvres Porcelain Manufactory: Alexandre Brongniart and the Triumph of Art and Industry 1800–1847*, edited by Beatrice Pannequin, Yale University Press, 1997, page 113. Expert: Maxime Charron, Paris.