Lot 48: EMMANUEL HANNAUX

EMMANUEL HANNAUX FRENCH 1855-1934 MERCURY signed: E HANNAUX , inscribed: E.M.II , with the EMILE MULLER PARIS pastille and stamped: IVRY ÉMILE MULLER PARIS and numbered 183 to the reverse enamelled stoneware diameter: 42cm., 16½in.

The fashion for enamelled stoneware was at its height in the 1890's and Emile Müller's tile manufacturing company - the Grand Tuilerie d'Ivry - was at the forefront of production. Müller approached artists and convinced them to have their work cast with his technique to create artistic editions usually limited to between two and five casts. Sculpture cast in stoneware even appeared at the Salon in the last few years of the century. Falguière, one of the sculptors who succumbed to Müller's persuasions, compared the material favourably with bronze, declaring that casts contained "not the smallest deformity. It is my own work, as it left my hands..."

Hannaux's Mercury and Cupid was one of his best known works. Muller's casting takes the motif of Mercury's head and sets it within a roundel. The texture of skin is differentiated with a matt treatment whilst the rest is glazed. The use of coloured glazing in the roundel heightens the fantasy mood of the subject.

RELATED LITERATURE
Breaking the Mould: Sculpture in Paris from Daumier to Rodin, ex. cat. Jane Voohees Zimmerli Art Museum, New Brunswick, 2006, pp. 98-115