Martin-Guillaume Biennais (French, 1764-1843)
Probably designed after Charles Percier (French, 1764-1838) and
Pierre François Léonard Fontaine (French, 1762-1853)
Paris, France
Double Salt (one of a pair)
INV-2516
Martin-Guillaume Biennais (French, 1764-1843)
Probably designed after Charles Percier (French, 1764-1838) and
Pierre François Léonard Fontaine (French, 1762-1853)
Paris, Francec. 1794-1819
Double Salt (one of a pair)
Martin-Guillaume Biennais (French, 1764-1843) Probably designed after Charles Percier (French, 1764-1838) and Pierre François Léonard Fontaine (French, 1762-1853) Paris, France →napoleonicempireNeoclassicismdish (vessel)silver
Date
c. 1794-1819
Medium
Gilt silver
Dimensions
Salt bowls: Diam.: 9.5 cm (2 1/8 in.); ; Overall: 22 × 20.5 cm (8 1/2 × 8 1/8 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Gift of Mrs. Charles V. Hickox
This pair of double salts is part of a vast service made for Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte’s sister Pauline on the occasion of her marriage to the Roman nobleman Camillo Borghese, Sixth Prince of Sulmona.
In the years after the French Revolution, architects and designers adopted the visual language of ancient Greece and Rome to express the new imperial order. Napoleon, hoping to promote Paris’s luxury trades, commissioned several silver dinner services as gifts to be sent abroad. The slender outlines and smooth surfaces of the vessels in the Borghese service contrast with the rich decoration.
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