Blue watch egg with snake

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Blue watch egg with snake

The blue clock egg with snake is an "imperial" Fabergé egg with an integrated clock, which was made in the workshop of the Russian jeweler Peter Carl Fabergé by the goldsmith Michail Perchin . The egg was a present from the Russian Tsar Nicholas II to his mother, the Tsar's widow Maria Feodorovna , for Easter in 1895.

The egg, which is 18.3 centimeters high without a base or base, is made of various colored gold alloys . It is set with cut diamonds and covered with translucent royal blue and white decorative enamel. It was initially regarded by research as the Third Imperial Egg and dated to the year 1887. It was not until 2008 that photos of this third Fabergé egg appeared, so the dating of the blue clock egg with snake had to be changed to 1895.

After the tsar's family was murdered and the tsar's mother fled into exile in Denmark, the egg became part of the Soviet state's possession and eventually entered the international art trade. Stavros Niarchos bought it in 1972 and gave it to Prince Rainier III of Monaco in 1974 . for the silver jubilee of the throne. It is now in the collection of Prince Albert II of Monaco .

background

Pendule by Jean André Lepaute, 1774, Walters Art Museum Pendule by Jean Baptiste Lepaute and Pierre Henry-Lepaute, after 1775, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Pendule by Jean André Lepaute , 1774, Walters Art Museum
Pendule by Jean Baptiste Lepaute and Pierre Henry-Lepaute, after 1775, Metropolitan Museum of Art

In 1885, the Russian jeweler Peter Carl Fabergé began manufacturing elaborately designed Easter eggs, ten of which were sent to the court of the Russian Tsar Alexander III by 1894 . were sold. He gave them to his wife Maria Feodorovna on Easter . After the death of Alexander, Tsar Nicholas II continued the tradition. By 1916, 40 more eggs had been delivered and given away to Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna and Nikolaus' mother, Maria Feodorovna . The two eggs destined for 1917 were no longer delivered. In addition to these 52 “imperial” Fabergé eggs, more than a dozen were produced for private clients. Among them, the Marlborough Egg or Pink Clock Egg with Snake, made in 1902 for Lady Consuelo Spencer-Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough , strongly resembles the Blue Clock Egg with Snake .

Most of the Fabergé eggs contained a surprise hidden inside, such as enamel miniatures by a court painter or a model of a ship or a carriage made from precious materials. In the case of the clock eggs, the built-in clock is seen as the surprise.

Pendulum in urn shape
unknown watchmaker , late 19th century

Link to the picture
(please note copyrights )

Pendulums in the shape of an urn with a circumferential ring-shaped dial were always rare, but they were bought by the royal watchmakers Jean André Lepaute , Jean Baptiste Lepaute , Pierre Henry-Lepaute and other family members as early as the 18th century in the vicinity of the Manufacture royale de porcelaine de Sèvres in Sèvres manufactured. The snake motif was used in these early clocks. In 2012, the London art auction house Bonhams auctioned a pendulum clock in the form of a royal blue urn made of porcelain, dated to the late 19th century, which, with the snake as a pointer and the base with porcelain panels on the sides, bears a striking resemblance to the blue clock egg with snake . There can be no doubt that Fabergé was familiar with such watches and used them as inspiration.

description

The blue clock egg with snake looks like an oval urn with handles attached to the side. The egg is 183 millimeters high without a base or base. It is enamelled in royal blue and has a circumferential white enamelled band above the center, which bears the Roman numerals I to XII , which are depicted with cut diamonds . The egg is lavishly set in gold set with diamonds and rests on a metal foot with a shaft. A snake made of diamond-set gold winds around the foot and strives up to the number ring. The ring is driven by a clock mechanism housed inside the egg, so that the head and tongue of the snake point at the moving row of numbers. The egg with its foot in turn stands on a base, the three sides of which bear gold symbols of science and the arts on white enamel.

The egg has the Cyrillic initials of the goldsmith Michail Perchin in a rectangle as a brand . Perchin was Fabergé's workshop manager from 1886 until his death in 1903. Perchin only used the rectangular brand until 1897, when it was replaced by an oval one that year. There is also the hallmark used by Fabergé in Saint Petersburg until 1899, the number 56 with crossed anchors and scepter in a horizontal oval. The 56 indicates a fineness of 56 solotnik or 14 carats .

The information provided by Fabergé in the invoices that have been handed down to the Tsar's court were extremely brief. For the blue clock egg with snake , the bill from 1895 only stated “blue enamelled egg, Louis-seize style , 4500 rubles”.

Research history

The blue clock egg with snake was regarded as the Third Imperial Egg produced for 1887 until 2008 , although it did not fully correspond to the fragmentary information in Fabergé's invoice. The execution of the egg, which in 1887 would not have been possible in this quality, also spoke against such an early date. After the egg from 1887, which contains a ladies' watch inside as a surprise, was first recognized in a photo in an auction catalog from 1964 and finally found again in 2013 at a gold dealer in the USA, the blue watch egg with snake was correctly dated to 1895. It replaced the 12-monogram egg , which had previously been dated 1895, to 1896. The new date can be easily reconciled with the historical events and the execution of the egg . The production of an egg started shortly after Easter and took almost a year to complete. During the production of the blue clock ice with snake , the client, Emperor Alexander III, died. The egg was completed as planned and shows no evidence of the Tsar who died in autumn 1894. Only the Fabergé egg, produced for 1896, shows six monograms of Alexander and his widow Maria Feodorovna on the outside and, as a surprise, harbors a series of miniatures with portraits of the deceased.

Provenance

The Blue Uhrenei with snake was built by Emperor Nicholas II. His mother, the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna , presented as a gift for Easter 1895th With that he continued the from his father Alexander III. The tradition established with the first ten “imperial” Fabergé eggs continued, but annually gave away two eggs, one to Maria Feodorovna and one to his wife Alexandra Feodorovna. The egg was then probably in the Anichkov Palace in Saint Petersburg .

In mid-September 1917, around 40 Fabergé eggs were brought to the armory of the Moscow Kremlin on behalf of the Kerensky government for security reasons . The tsarist family was murdered in 1918. Maria Feodorovna fled the Crimea to Denmark via England in 1919 . The eggs were likely handed over to the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR in February or March 1922 . In 1927 the blue watch egg with snake was probably sold by the Antikwariat , the department of the Soviet Ministry of Commerce responsible for the valorization of cultural goods, to Norman Michel of the Paris-based Australian Pearl Company. On October 2, 1950, the egg was sold for 3750 British pounds to Emanuel Snowman, co-owner of the London jewelry company Wartski , which specializes in Russian antiques and Fabergé objects . Until 1972 it was in the Wartski collection. The Greek shipowner and art collector Stavros Niarchos bought it on December 23, 1972 for £ 64,103.

Niarchos gave the blue clock egg with snake to Prince Rainier III of Monaco . for the silver jubilee on May 7, 1974. Rainier's wife, Gracia Patricia , loved the egg and gave it a place in her private study. After her accidental death in 1982, the room was sealed on orders from Rainier and left unchanged in memory of Gracia Patricia. With the exception of one exhibition, the Fabergé egg was thus also hidden from the public. Rainier was known that the egg was a Fabergé object. However, Niarchos had not told him that it was one of the rare “imperial” Fabergé eggs. In public, however, the egg was suspected to be in an unknown Swiss collector. Rainier died on April 6, 2005 and Prince Albert II inherited the egg.

Exhibitions

Exhibition 1902, the blue clock egg with a snake in the rear showcase, second level from below

At the World Exhibition in Paris in 1900 , 14 of the 20 “imperial” Fabergé eggs produced by then were presented, the blue clock egg with snake was not one of them. In March 1902, under the patronage of Alexandra Feodorovna, a charity exhibition with objects by Fabergé was held in the Petersburg palace of Baron Paul Pavlovich von Derwis. Numerous works of art were shown, mostly from the property of the tsarist family. The blue clock egg with a snake now also belonged to the numerous Fabergé eggs . The exhibition was only the second presentation of “imperial” Fabergé eggs and the first in Russia. It found great interest among the people of Petersburg. The Tsar couple attended the opening ceremony and Nicholas II noted in his diary on March 9th that it was a strange feeling to see objects from his own property and those of people close to him on display.

In May and June 1953, on the occasion of the coronation of Elizabeth II, the London art dealer Wartski held an exhibition entitled Carl Faberge Special Coronation Exhibition , at which, in addition to numerous other works by Fabergé, the Blue Clock Egg with a snake was shown. The egg, whose whereabouts have been unknown since it was sold to Niarchos, was again presented by Wartski in 1992 on loan from Prince Rainier in the “Fabergé from Private Collections” exhibition. From October 2008 to January 2009 the egg was on public display at the Cleveland Museum of Art as part of the “Artistic Luxury: Fabergé, Tiffany, Lalique” exhibition. The exhibition was subsequently shown at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco from February to May 2009 . From July to September 2009 the exhibition “Moscow. Splendors of the Romanovs ”in the Grimaldi Forum the next presentation. In October and November 2015 the egg was in the exhibition “The Romanovs and Grimaldi. Three centuries of history. XVII-XX century ”in the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow . From June 2018 to January 2019, it was shown in the "Fabergé Rediscovered" exhibition at the Hillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens in Washington, DC .

Web links

Commons : Blue clock egg with snake  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Annemiek Wintraecken: 1895 Blue Serpent Clock Egg. wintraecken.nl, January 8, 2019, accessed April 6, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Annemiek Wintraecken: The Duchess of Marlborough Egg. wintraecken.nl, January 8, 2019, accessed April 6, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Lot 20. A late 19th century French porcelain mounted ormolu cercle tournant clock. Bonhams , June 20, 2012, accessed April 8, 2020 .
  4. ↑ a b c d e f Fabergé Imperial Egg Chronology. In: Fabergé Research Site. 2020, accessed April 8, 2020 .
  5. ↑ Alexander von Solodkoff: Workshops and Workmasters . In: Christopher Forbes (ed.): Masterpieces from the House of Fabergé . Abradale Press, New York 1989, ISBN 0-8109-8089-4 , pp. 151-159 .
  6. ↑ Alexander von Solodkoff: Marks on Fabergé Objects . In: Christopher Forbes (ed.): Masterpieces from the House of Fabergé . Abradale Press, New York 1989, ISBN 0-8109-8089-4 , pp. 161-162 .
  7. ↑ a b Annemiek Wintraecken: The Fabergé Imperial Easter Eggs: New Discoveries Revise Timeline by Annemiek Wintraecken. wintraecken.nl, February 12, 2019, accessed on April 8, 2020 .
  8. ^ Tatiana Fabergé, Lynette G. Proler, Valentin V. Skurlov: The Fabergé Imperial Easter Eggs . Christies, London 1997, ISBN 0-903432-48-X , pp. 240 .
  9. ↑ Annemiek Wintraecken: 1887 Third Imperial Egg. wintraecken.nl, January 8, 2019, accessed April 8, 2020 .
  10. ↑ Alexander von Solodkoff: Imperial Easter Eggs . In: Christopher Forbes (ed.): Masterpieces from the House of Fabergé . Abradale Press, New York 1989, ISBN 0-8109-8089-4 , pp. 54-110 .
  11. ↑ Annemiek Wintraecken: Early Imperial Egg Exhibitions. 1902 by Dervis Fabergé Exhibition, Saint Petersburg, Russia. wintraecken.nl, September 20, 2019, accessed on April 8, 2020 .
  12. ↑ Wartski (Ed.): Carl Faberge Special Coronation Exhibition 20th May-13th June 1953 . Exhibition catalog. Self-published, 1953.
  13. ↑ Annemiek Wintraecken: Fabergé Eggs on Exhibition 2005-2015. wintraecken.nl, January 22, 2019, accessed April 8, 2020 .
  14. ↑ Annemiek Wintraecken: Fabergé Eggs on Exhibitions 2016-2020. wintraecken.nl, January 12, 2020, accessed April 8, 2020 .