Monumental vase on the theme of autumn
by PIGALLE, Jean-Baptiste, Marble, height 179 cm
The architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel designed four vases, two representing spring and two autumn, for Louis XV’s Château at Choisy, near Sceaux. The sculptors Jean-Baptiste Pigalle and Nicolas-S�bastien Adam each carved one on the theme of autumn (now both in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), and the Flemish-born sculptor Jacques Verberckt (1704-1771) carved the pair dedicated to spring (now in the Mus�e du Louvre, Paris, and in the Château de Malmaison).
Like many garden ornaments of the period of Louis XIV and Louis XV, the vases are indebted to ancient precedent. The kalyx-krater form, based on an ancient Greek vase type, with fluted base and handles springing from satyrs’ heads, became a paradigm for Baroque and Rococo garden ornaments.