A SEVRES PORCELAIN BLEU LAPIS-GROUND TWO-HANDLED BOTTLE-COOLER (SEAU A BOUTEILLE ORDINAIRE)

This bottle-cooler (seau à boutteille ordinaire) is painted Louis-Denis Armand l'aîné, one of the factory's foremost bird painters, who was recorded at Vincennes and Sèvres from 1746 to 1788. Armand was one of the higest paid artists working at the factory and his hand is evident on many important commissions decorated with birds, and on components for the finest dinner services. This elaborately decorated seau has not been identified as being part of a dinner service and was probably sold as an individual item or as part of a pair. There is a pair of seaux à demi-bouteille, (c. 1754) with similar decoration in the Royal Collection, see Geoffrey de Bellaigue, French Porcelain in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen, London, 2009, Vol. II, p. 558, no. 132.