‘Three Graces’ coffee can (goblet litron) and ‘Cupid’ saucer
John Whitehead, a leading authority on Sèvres, considers this to be ‘one of the finest Sèvres cups and saucers of this period that I have seen’. The PT mark on the base would normally denote Pierre-Nicolas Pithou (active 1759-1790), one of the best figure painters at Sèvres, whose finest work can be seen on a service for Louis XVI now in the Royal Collection. However, it is believed he left the factory in 1790, the year before the date-letter on the cup and saucer. However, as his brother Nicolas-Pierre Pithou (1750-1818) was another major figure painter, John Whitehead conjectures that the Three Graces could be by his hand.
The painting on the cup was adapted from an engraving Les Graces, dating to 1769, after Carle or Charles-André van Loo’s (1705-1765) Three Graces (1763). The print survives in the factory archives. The painting on the saucer of Cupid is also after a work by van Loo, Cupid Shooting a Bow (1761). The flower painting is the work of Jean-Nicolas Le Bel (active 1765-1793), who was one of the best painters at the factory.
