Water carrier
Medium
Faience (tin-glazed earthenware)
Dimensions
Height: 7 1/2 in. (19.1 cm)
Classification
Ceramics-Pottery
Culture
French, St. Clement
Department
European Sculpture and Decorative Arts
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of R. Thornton Wilson, in memory of Florence Ellsworth Wilson, 1950
Accession Number
50.211.112
Tags
Art Historical Context
Step into the enchanting world of 18th French decorative arts with *Water Carrier*, a delicate faience figurine crafted around 1765. Attributed to sculptor Paul-Louis Cyfflé, directed the renowned Saint-Clément faience in Lorraine, and modeled after a design by the celebrated Rococo master Edme Bouchardon, this 7½-inch (19.1 cm) tin-glazedware piece captures a humble everyday figure—a man bearing a water jug on his shoulder. Now housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's European Sculpture and Decorative Arts collection, it was generously gifted in 1950. Faience, with its vibrant tin glaze pr...