Georges Hoentschel (1855-1915) Coupe Aux Gouttes d'Or ~1900. School Of Carriès, Grittel, Puisaye

Superb stoneware bowl by Georges Hoentschel, circa 1890/1900, signed with the usual impressed mark on the reverse. Height: 5.5 cm, diameter: 13.2 cm, circumference: 42 cm. Very good condition; the previous owner confirmed having two small chips on the rim restored, but these are now missing. This is a superb stoneware bowl by Georges Hoentschel, circa 1890/1900, mounted using the string method. Diagonal striations are indeed visible, and on the base, the artist has created a series of impressed impressions. This bowl is decorated with a superb textured glaze in very rich tones of browns, ochres, reddish-browns tending towards burgundy, khaki, and traces of black inside. Finally, the potter decorated the rim with rich gold drips, a technique emblematic of Hoentschel. Indeed, like Jean Carriès, he loved to add rich drips of genuine gold or silver to his finest pieces. Georges Hoentschel, the French decorator, collector, and ceramist, needs no introduction. He was part of the renowned Carriès school near Saint-Amand-en-Puisaye, alongside Jean Carriès, its leading figure, and later Grittel, Jeanneney, Lee, Pointu, Vallombreuse, Abbé Pacton, and Lion. This school brought together the greatest ceramists of the Art Nouveau period. Georges Hoentschel, born on June 1, 1855, in Montmartre and died on December 8, 1915, in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, was a French architect, decorator, ceramicist, and collector. He decorated Julius Wernher's residence, Bath House (82 Piccadilly Westminster), as well as part of Luton Hoo Castle in Bedfordshire, Rochefort Castle in Yvelines, and Bois-Boudran Castle. He also designed interiors for the Duke of Gramont, Robert de Montesquiou, the Marquis de Ganay, Count and Countess Greffulhe, King George of Greece, Emperor Meiji Teino of Japan, Jacques Doucet, and others. He designed the decoration for the pavilion of the Union Centrale des Arts Décoratifs at the 1900 Universal Exposition in Paris, which was also exhibited in St. Louis, USA, in 1904. This Art Nouveau style decoration can be seen today at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. In Argentina, he decorated the Hotel Errazuriz in Buenos Aires. For over thirty years, Georges Hoentschel collected furniture, paintings, and decorative elements in various styles that could be useful to him in his professional practice. He first exhibited them in the Retiro Park, then in the vast rooms of the private mansion he had specially fitted out on Boulevard Flandrin, starting in 1903. He is very well known as a collector in the United States because he bequeathed a large part of his collections to his friend John Pierpont Morgan; this portion, comprising 1,882 pieces, now forms the core of the collections of the 18th-century French and Medieval departments at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Among other notable figures, he was a friend of Marcel Proust, Giovanni Boldini, Paul-César Helleu, Pierre Georges Jeanniot, Georges Feydeau, Adolphe Léon Willette, Léopold Stevens, Robert de Montesquiou, Jean Carriès, Ferdinand Roybet, Maurice Lobre, Adrien Karbowsky, Victor Hugo, Georges de Porto-Riche, Edgar Degas, Jacques Doucet, Jean-Louis Forain, and Adolphe Giraldon. A ceramist himself, he also collected ceramics, some of which he exhibited at the 1900 Universal Exhibition. He made a significant bequest of ceramics to the Petit Palais in Paris, originating from the Saint-Amand-en-Puisaye workshop of his close friend Jean Carriès, which he acquired shortly before the latter's death. Subsequently, Hoentschel donated to the city of Paris the artist's nearly complete collection, housed at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs. He had a strong affinity for the Impressionists, having acquired, among other works, Claude Monet's *The Debacle, Gray Weather*, Édouard Manet's *Apple on a Plate*, Manet's *Child with a Sword*, Manet's *Rue Mosnier with Pavers* or *Rue de Berne*, William Turner's *The Fire*, and numerous works by James Abbott Whistler, Adolphe Léon Willette, Camille Pissarro, and Alfred Sisley. Hoentschel was renowned for his discerning eye as a collector. In his diary entry of January 23, 1919, art dealer René Gimpel (1881-1945), who knew him, indicates that he was the nephew of his colleague Knoedler. He recounts his last visit to Hoentschel's home before the posthumous sale: "This morning, I'm walking through his townhouse with Paulme, the expert. Hoentschel died at the beginning of the war. He decorated my townhouse on Rue Spontini for Doucet. He was truly the only decorator of the last twenty-five years. He had assembled two collections, one of enamels, the other of 18th-century decorative arts, and he sold them for a very high price to J.P. Morgan, who donated the 18th-century pieces to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. This interior is a blend of English comfort and Parisian elegance, with an immense room, arranged with his profession in mind. The sale will take place in two months." It's nothing more than a