This lavishly decorative period of European art emanated during Louis XV's reign. The hallmarks of rococo (from the French rocaille, "rock-work") are asymmetry, architectural decoration filled with arabesques, and elaborate curves. Among the most famous painters of the period were Francois Boucher, Honore Fragonard, and Antoine Watteau. The latter is seen as one of the originators of the style along with designer Pierre Lepautre. Of course, rococo turned up in other European countries, especially in the Austrian and German territories, where it blossomed into its most gaudy excesses.

Aside from painting and architectural designs, rococo also affected interior design and left its mark on a multitude of decorative objects, especially those created from soft-paste porcelain decorated with heavy gilding and brilliant colours. The usual response to a room decorated in rococo style, with its surfeit of decoration upon decoration, may well be one of "kitsch," because the often very delightful objects are drowned in an unrelenting sea of curlicues, of heavily gilded mirrors and decorative plaster work. One need only think of the Amalienburg Pavilion near Munich,  which has an interior that resembles an over-decorated jewellery box.

The Gardiner's exhibit avoids this excess. Every item can be observed in its own space. This allows us to obtain an appreciation of the imaginative designs and the craftsmanship employed in its creation. "It gives us an unparalleled opportunity to see them in a new light," as Chilton put it the day of the show's opening. It also gives us an opportunity to view works that have at one time been owned or commissioned by one of the most famous courtesans of French history, Madame de Pompadour. Rococo is an art form that can best be described as having celebrated the life of the aristocrats of France and other European nations; it represented an idyllic life far removed from the realities of every day life of the majority of the citizens of these countries. It is frequently sentimental in its imagery and at its worst it is crass.

One of the most delicate, yet elaborate pieces in this exhibition is a basket of flowers, which stems from between the 1740s to 1751. The basket, applied with forget-me-nots, was made of hard-paste porcelain at the Meissen factory in the 1740s. It was then sent to France, where it was filled with Vincennes soft-paste flowers that were modelled after real examples. Their stems are mostly made of painted metal, and the leaves are made either of silk or metal. The whole arrangement is very life-like. It could easily fit into a modern home, especially now that there is a passion for silk flower arrangements, even if the basket is somewhat ornate for our tastes.

Some of the tea sets might also be easily incorporated into our own homes, now that teas are once again gaining favour. They would most certainly be the centre of attention at any gathering. Other works, however, regardless of their individual beauty and intricacy of workmanship and artistic conception will most likely appear as oddities in our modern decor. One can perhaps visualize a single piece of this rococo porcelain in our modern spaces, in a special place of its own, where it will not compete with other objects. A collection of several items will be too much for our modern sensibilities.

Although the main object of this exhibition is to display the ceramic works, it is worthwhile taking a closer look at the paintings that Chilton managed to obtain from various sources to complement this show. They put all of the items further into perspective for us.

Those, who are familiar with the Limoges blue or "blue de roi", will be surprised to see the same colour glaze on several of the Sèvres pieces. It turns out that the Limoges factory, which was established in the late 1770s to produce hard-paste porcelain, copied it and became famous for it.

When looking at the pieces in the collection, one marvels at the delicacy and intricacy of the trays, urns, vases, wine coolers and figurines. Aside from the highly coloured and gilded pieces, there are some very fine bisque (biscuit) statuettes, which in their soft creamy whiteness can easily fit into our own time. Called Friendship (L'Amitié) they are, of course, created in a style we see as sentimental, but yet, we cannot help but admire them.

Some explanations may well be needed here about what constitutes soft-paste, hard-paste and bisque (or biscuit) porcelain. The latter is easy to explain. It refers to unglazed porcelain, and can be made of either the soft- or hard-paste variety.

Soft-paste porcelain, which some porcelain snobs call artificial porcelain, was developed in Europe in imitation of the Chinese hard-paste variety. When through various trade routes Chinese porcelain began to arrive in Europe, the Europeans tried to find a way, through a variety of materials, to create a porcelain that was as nearly as possible like the Chinese in whiteness, translucence and hardness. Through many trials and errors they arrived at a soft-paste consisting of fine clay and various glasslike substances. Soft-paste (or frit porcelain) is fired at about 1100°C (2012°F). Frit is a vitreous composition, such as a calcined mixture of silica and fluxes.

Then kaolin, a white clay used for centuries by the Chinese in conjunction with petuntse, was discovered in Germany. A chemist, Johann Friedrich Bottgert, discovered how to make hard-paste porcelain from this clay around 1708. His discovery led to the founding of the famous Meissen factory in 1710 (sometimes also called Dresden china). For almost a century it surpassed all other hard-paste porcelain made in Europe. Hard-paste porcelain is fired at about 1250°C (2280°F) to 1450°C(2640°F).

If you want to know whether you have a piece of soft- or hard-paste porcelain, you have to break it. The soft-paste variety will reveal a grainy body covered with a glasslike layer of glaze. When hard-paste porcelain breaks, it is impossible to distinguish the body from the glaze.

A clarification is also, perhaps, required about the reference to Chantilly, Vincennes and Sèvres. The first porcelain factories in France were established in Lille, Rouen, St. Cloud, and Chantilly. Then, in 1738 workers from the factory in Chantilly founded a company at the Chateau de Vincennes. Eventually, during the reign of Louis XV, the operations were moved to Sèvres, and the factory was renamed for that town.

The exhibit at the Gardiner is of particular importance because all of the moulds at Sèvres associated with the pre-revolution monarchy were destroyed at the behest of Alexandre Brogniart. He had been appointed director of Sèvres in 1800 after it had become property of the state. To raise funds to pay his workers and buy raw materials, he also sold off any outdated merchandise. Hence, to have a certified piece of porcelain from pre-revolution Sèvres means one holds a very rare object, indeed. Not many of us could afford to purchase such items, but the man, whose passion for this kind of porcelain led to the Wadsworth Gallery's 240 piece collection, could. Hartford born financier J.P. Morgan bequeathed a total of 1,325 art object to this gallery, which is the oldest public art museum in the United States.

The 40 objects that Chilton selected from the Wadsworth collection have never before been seen outside the United States since they landed at the Hartford museum. It is, therefore, well worth a trip to downtown Toronto to take a peek at what Madame de Pompadour once treasured.

[Passion & Porcelain, Pre-Revolutionary French Ceramics, Gardiner Museum of Ceramics, to January 18, 2004]

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