Drie ontwerpen voor vazen c. 1780 - 1800

Curator: Take a look at this delicate drawing entitled "Drie ontwerpen voor vazen", or "Three Designs for Vases", dating from around 1780 to 1800. It's a pen and ink sketch on paper, attributed to Carlo Bianconi. Editor: Immediately, I’m struck by the sheer ornamentation – almost overwhelming. There’s a dreamlike quality in these freehand sketches. It's as if Bianconi's pen dances across the paper with these very fanciful ideas. Curator: The ornamentation speaks directly to the Neoclassical style popular at the time. Vases themselves held enormous symbolic weight, evoking classical antiquity and, by extension, ideas of order, reason, and enduring beauty. Notice the figures in the central vase, framed as a cameo. Editor: Right, I can see that nod to the “rational” aesthetic, but I still find a tension here. The sheer excess seems to push back against that, creating something far more romantic, and even playful, than a purely academic exercise in neoclassical restraint might suggest. Curator: That’s a good point! The vase, historically, has been associated with funerary practices, so these vessels were tied up with notions of remembrance, loss and cycles of life, and these are all expressed through design and pattern here. Editor: I wonder who these vessels were really for? Did they exist beyond the paper or would the idea ever been realized in material form? Who were the intended consumer, what purpose was this beauty for? Curator: These were created at a fascinating period in Western history and I like the ways they embody this constant negotiation between form, symbol and decoration. Editor: For me, viewing artwork from an activist lens always inspires more questions than answers, so the exploration feels essential. Curator: I agree. Ultimately, this little sketch reminds us that every era reinterprets the past, and in that creative reinterpretation, new meanings emerge.