Antique Tripod Gilded Bronze Porcelain France Paris, Late XIX Century

Vase holder tripod in gilded bronze and Sèvres ceramic, modeled after Pierre Gouthière. Circular base in cobalt blue Sèvres porcelain, with golden decorations on the top and wreath of myrtle leaves on the band; underneath three feet in gilded bronze with a spiral motif support the whole thing. The three bronze goat feet rest on the surface with an upside-down pine cone in the centre; the tripod is contained by a band decorated with frets in the lower part, the uprights end with faun heads characterized by a long beard and ram's horns, connected to each other by festoons of vine leaves and bunches of grapes. In the centre, descending from above following a spiral trajectory, is the figure of a snake with a body covered in scales and a wide open mouth. On the top it has a second pine cone element, opposite to the first, surmounted by a tuft of leaves arranged in a radial pattern and by a vase holder plate, the latter embellished with a fret and ending with a perforated railing element with an everted edge. These elements, originally separated by a Sèvres porcelain vase missing here, were superimposed and fixed together at a later stage. The base features the Sèvres manufacturing mark.