Beyond the Border: Huguenot Goldsmiths in Northern Europe and North America

V&A Conference Beyond the Border: Huguenot goldsmiths in Northern Europe and North America

13 January 2007

Abstracts Michèle Bimbenet-Privat

Huguenot goldsmiths in France before the Revocation: Fame and Commercial Success

From the signing of the Edict of Nantes in 1598, Huguenot goldsmiths in France enjoyed relative tolerance in an era that historians have described as 'The Regime of the Edict'. Permission to practice their religion in a town par bailliage suited craftsmen such as goldsmiths, where their groups conformed to the patterns of community life. Certain communities of goldsmiths were particularly well known for being dominated by Huguenots; the best example is that of Blois, which flourished under the protection of the royal prince, Gaston d'Orleans. Adherence to the Religion Pretendue Reformee influenced their output. Whereas Catholic goldsmiths supplied large-scale sacred silver, Huguenot goldsmiths catered for a civic clientele and concentrated on the production of jewellery, watchmaking and enamelling. It is no coincidence that the pioneers of painted enamelling in the years 1630 to 1650, the Toutins, the Petitots and the Du Guerniers, were all Huguenot goldsmiths. In Paris, where the sophisticated market encouraged a greater degree of specialisation, Huguenot goldsmiths often worked in the Galerie du Louvre. There they developed innovative techniques and their resulting reputation led to foreign demand for their work. This explains why from the 1630s and even more from the Restoration of the Stuarts, leading Huguenot goldsmiths left France to do business in England. Some were established there well before the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 provoked the waves of forced immigration of skilled goldsmiths leading to the phenomenon described by British historians as 'Huguenot silver'.

Jet Pijzel-Dommisse

Huguenot goldsmiths and their influence in the Hague in the late 17th century

Thousands of French Huguenot refugees settled in the Northern Netherlands, but only a small part of them actually was a goldsmith, and an even smaller part came from Paris. However there were other ways of getting acquainted with the French fashion: the Dutch court in The Hague was always strongly focused on France, ambassadors were showing their plate, Daniel Marot was designing for William and Mary and their courtiers and ornamental prints of the major French artists were sold and republished in The Hague and Amsterdam. The lecture will focus on Adam Loofs, the main Dutch goldsmith working in the French style in Holland. Born in Amsterdam he worked in Paris until 1680, when he became court goldsmith and Keeper of the gold and silver of William III in The Hague. Research into his work and recently into two pairs of impressive vases, marked by Loofs or attributed to him, in the Portland Collection at Welbeck, has resulted into a journey alongside French silver at the court of Louis XIV, the Keddleston fountain, Italian Renaissance design and ornamental prints, to the Dutch interpretation of the Louis XIV style in Holland.

David Barquist

Huguenot Silversmiths in Colonial New York and Philadelphia

Beginning as early as 1687, the Huguenot Bartholomew LeRoux I was the first non- Dutch silversmith to work in New York City, and in the same decade his co-religionist César Ghiselin became the first silversmith to settle in the new city of Philadelphia. Over the next century, craftsmen of Huguenot ancestry in these two cities frequently had close professional, familial, or religious ties, but the roles they played in each city differed dramatically. In New York, Huguenot silversmiths such as Simeon Soumaine and Charles Le Roux were major figures, frequently receiving important public and private commissions and producing stylistically innovative work. In contrast, Philadelphia Huguenots in the precious metal trades, such as William Vilant and Philip Hulbeart, seem to have worked on a subsidiary level and produced a relatively small body of objects that conformed to prevailing local taste.

Beth Carver Wees

Huguenot Silversmiths in Colonial Boston and Charleston

Among the wave of Huguenot refugees who immigrated to the North American colonies between the 1680s and the mid-eighteenth century were a small number of individuals trained as goldsmiths and jewellers. In the predominantly English city of Boston and in the wealthy planter society of Charleston they found vastly different lives. The ease and rapidity with which they assimilated decidedly altered their cultural identities. Few objects survive from the workshops of René Grignion, Peter Feurt, and Paul Revere Sr. in Boston or those of Nicolas de Longemare Jr., Solomon Légaré, and Alexander Petrie in Charleston. Their stories, however, and the roles played by Huguenot merchants and patrons, offer a framework within which to examine the Huguenot influence on silver made and used in their adoptive colonies.

John Bowen

Huguenots goldsmiths in Ireland: Cork

This illustrated presentation will outline the geographical and historical context which made Ireland in general, and Cork in particular, a destination for Huguenot refugees in the late seventeenth century, and how a small number of them who were goldsmiths by trade came to practice their trade in that city and county. In spite of the opposition of the incumbent trades people of Cork on competition grounds, these immigrant Huguenots had a significant impact on the society they came to be part of, establishing themselves very successfully. The Huguenot goldsmiths amongst them, never many in number, left a small but very significant legacy in the form of some fine wrought silver. Their story is difficult and challenging to piece together given the paucity of surviving records and accounts, and indeed items of their work. The presentation will sketch how the Huguenot influence endured for a few generations as well as how they became eventually assimilated into the mainstream. The presentation will particularly focus on the work of two original Huguenot goldsmith refugees, Anthony Semirot and Adam Billon, showing examples of their work as well as similar indigenous work for comparison. It will also comment briefly on a number of other Huguenot goldsmiths in Cork and elsewhere in Ireland.

Tessa Murdoch

International influences on Paul de Lamerie and second-generation Huguenot goldsmiths in London

Paul de Lamerie grew up in London's West End in a melting pot of continental talent which flourished in a culture free of the constraints of the rigid guild system which wielded its authority in France. This paper will look at the extent to which de Lamerie and his contemporaries drew on skills of professional designers, modellers and sculptors and a wealth of ornamental prints. It will examine other artistic influences on the taste for and production of high-style rococo silver which ranged from architectural ornament to sugar sculpture.

Particular attention will be focused on the links with German-born craftsmen as de Lamerie's style has a closer affinity with contemporary German silver whereas Paul Crespin's work is French in inspiration. De Lamerie's contemporaries, Paul Crespin and Charles Kandler, both worked on a new scale in the 1720s creating silver sculpture - illustrated by Crespin's silver bath for the King of Portugal and Kandler's Jerningham wine cooler and Arundel tabernacle. In the 1730s and 1740s silver marked by de Lamerie and contemporary unmarked pieces pushed the boundaries of decoration of silver beyond the limit. Parallels existed in the productions of the Chelsea porcelain factory founded by the goldsmith Nicholas Sprimont who designed a tureen for Thomas Coke, Earl of Leicester at Holkham. These extraordinary creations form a contrast with the sober forms of Huguenot silver produced in North America and Ireland, but parallels can be found in the work of second generation Huguenot goldsmiths in The Netherlands, where a similar culture of cross-fertilisation existed between the different artistic specialities.

Professor Dr Hans Ottomeyer Huguenot goldsmiths in Berlin and Kassel in the 17th and 18th Centuries

After the revocation of the Edict of Nantes about 40.000 Huguenots left the Kingdom of France for Calvinist German territories. Most of them found new places to live and work in Brandenburg, Hessen Kassel, in the town of Erlangen and around Ansbach. In Berlin and Kassel Huguenot silversmiths gained leading positions because they were able to produce new modern forms for the hot beverages coffee, tea and chocolate. These forms were fashioned in the sober, restrained style, characteristic of the Huguenot silver made in Berlin, Kassel and other German towns. One third of the Huguenot silversmiths, including the makers Baudoin, Beaucair and Rollin, came from the Lorraine town of Metz where they worked. In Germany, at first they avoided corporation law and only later joined local City guilds. Some made large wine jugs and bread plates for the local Calvinistic churches were everybody shared wine and bread in memory of the Last Supper.

In Germany there was a Huguenot style. Whether this was the result of common training, exchange or the influence of the Huguenot ethic will be discussed. Although the style did not survive the end of the eighteenth century, it influenced the development of silver in Berlin and Kassel