Bowl

A shallow bowl with a six-angle bottom and a six-flake collar, covered with multicolour enamel on both sides. The decoration inside the collar is composed against a white background. It is formed by flowers and birds in green, yellow and sapphire colours. The outer sides, covered with black enamel and gilded in arabesques and flowers,,
form a bordure for scenes placed on both sides of the bottom. A six-sided bottom is covered from the inside with an en grisaille decoration against a black background depicting the figure of sitting St. John. The saint holds a cross in his right hand and
embraces a lamb with his left hand. Above, there is an inscription in gilded letters: S. Joannes. On the outside, at the bottom, there is a multicolour summer landscape with small houses against a group of trees. 
In the left bottom corner of the representation inside the bowl, a monogram I.L. is painted in black (this monogram was used both by Jacques Laudin I and Jacques Laudin II).

Master Jacques Laudin (ca. 1627–1695) was known as Jacques I. His cousin Jacques Laudin (1663–1729), known as Jacques II, created works also in Limoges, where he inherited the workshop. According to the note of the British Museum, Jacques Laudin I was the son of Noël I Laudin (1586–1681), the founder of the dynasty of enamellers.

The bowl is one of the three vessels with a very similar composition of decoration that are preserved in Wilanów collections (alongside Wil.208 and Wil.209).

On the basis of scarce original information, we can suppose that the collection of Limoges enamels in Wilanów was presumably created by Aleksander Potocki.

All three bowls were shown to the Warsaw audience during An Exhibition of Antique and Art Objects in the palace of Count August Potocki and his wife at Krakowskie Przedmieście 32 (today the Museum of the University of Warsaw) in 1856. They are described in the catalogue of this exhibition under item 809.

Joanna Paprocka-Gajek