Design for a Soup Plate

In 1889, a huge dinner service caught the attention of critics attending the exhibition of ceramics at the Paris World’s Fair. It comprised more than 300 pieces of porcelain, many of novel form and each with a unique pattern of floral decoration set amid vibrant abstract swooshes. This watercolor is a design for the decoration of one of the many plates. It is the work of Jules-Auguste Habert-Dys, designer of the entire service. The flowers sprouted in Habert-Dys’s imagination and are unknown in nature. At the lower left are detailed notes on the colors, and the bold inscription “fait” (done) recorded the completion of the finished porcelain plate. Though largely forgotten today, Habert-Dys deserves recognition as a pioneer of the free-flowing style that became known as Art Nouveau, which became popular in the 1890s. His 1889 service appears to have been a commercial failure, which a contemporary blamed on its high price and avant-garde design. Not until the following century would such abstraction gain popular appeal.