Tobacco jar - Lot 46

Tobacco jar Terracotta, 20th century A figure depicting an old shepherd, bent under the weight of age, walking with a stick that serves as his cane. He is leaning against a large hollowed-out tree trunk that serves as the tobacco jar; the lid’s handle is a curved wooden branch. On the body of the jar, above a smooth area intended for an inscription, a well-drawn cicada evokes Provence. Signed “P Fouque” for Paul Fouque, son of Jean-Baptiste, himself a former student of the Beaux-Arts, with whom he founded the “Santons Fou-que” workshop in Aix-en-Provence in 1934. Not to be confused with the Fouque of Moustiers (Joseph, the founder), who was a partner and later successor to Pierre Clerissy II—a much older firm that has no connection to the family of santon makers discussed here. Mireille Fouque, Paul’s daughter, confirmed to me that this pot is part of a series her father produced between 1950 and 1958—some with a santon on a pedestal, as seen here, and others without a figure. Each pot could feature a varying number of santons and take on a different shape depending on whether it was intended to be a tobacco jar, a piggy bank, a trinket dish, or a candy jar. The space near the cicada was used to inscribe, in India ink, the name of the person receiving the pot as a gift or an inscription such as “Happy Birthday, Dad,” etc. These models were sold for nearly ten years. A few chips. H 15.5 cm