Old Paris Porcelain Teapot by Dagoty, c. 1810

Old Paris porcelain teapot with black matte ground and fine neoclassical gilt decoration, painted with Raphael's "Madonna and Child with St. John" aka "Madonna of the Chair". Signed in gilt, P. L. Dagoty./ La Sainte Famille (The Holy Family)

The Dagoty porcelain factory in Paris was founded by brothers Jean-Baptiste Etienne and Pierre Louis Dagoty in 1798. It quickly rose to prominence, receiving commissions from the palaces of Versailles and Fontainebleau. By 1804, Napoleon's wife, Josephine, had granted Dagoty the title of the Empress's Porcelain Factory. The quality of their production rivaled Sevres.

The paintings of Raphael (1483-1520) were very popular in France and throughout Europe from the end of the 18th through much of the 19th centuries, especially his masterpiece, "Madonna and Child with St. John" aka "Madonna of the Chair" which hangs in the Pitti Place, Florence. Ingres was a great admirer of this painting and worked it into numerous paintings, most subtly in the carpet in his famous 1806 portrait, "Napoleon I on his Imperial Throne", pictured here.

Dagoty also produced a 14" Medici vase, also with a black ground and very fine gilding painted with "Madonna and Child with St. John", now in the Louvre.[1]

[1] Regine de Plinval de Guillebon "Dagoty a Paris : La Manufacture de Porcelaine de L'imperatrice" (Paris: Musee de Malmaison, 2006) pp. 20-21.