Unveiling The Hope Cup: Witness the Epic Tale of Perseus Come to Life on this Magnificent $2M Vase

‘The Hope Vase – an extraordinary affair of flawless technique (…)’, as Arthur Grimwade, one of the world’s greatest experts on Silver, once described the iconic present lot, was made as a special commission for Henry Thomas Hope by Jean-Valentin Morel (1794-1860), one of the most talented goldsmiths of the 19th century (Arthur Grimwade, Silver for Sale: Christie’s in the Thirties, Norwich, 1994, p. 165). Shown at the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1855 (official catalogue, class 17, section 5, no. 5104), Morel won the great medal for this true tour de force of enamelling and lapidary art that tells the story of Perseus and Andromeda from Classical Greek Mythology: ‘La coupe est tirée d’un bloc de jaspe qui pesait quatre-vingt livres, c’est la plus grosse pièce de jaspe oriental que l’on connaisse. La taille a demandé trois ans de travail et l’invention de nombreux procédés’ (L. Dussieux, Les Artistes Français à l'étranger: Recherches sur leurs Travaux et sur leur Influence en Europe; Précédés d'un Essai sur les Origines et le Développement des Arts en France, Paris, 1856).

Jean-Valentin Morel, born in 1794 to the renowned Parisian lapidary and jeweller Valentin Morel, was an apprentice to his father, but also taught by the renowned gold box maker Adrien Vachette, who created a number of high quality boxes for Napoléon I, Emperor of the French. In 1827, Jean-Valentin established his own business for objets d’art in enamel, gold, precious stones and tortoiseshell; he soon employed more than fifty workmen in his flourishing workshop. His objects were highly sought after in Europe and further afield. 
In 1852, he began to work on his most remarkable accomplishment. In its exuberance, extraordinary craftsmanship and visionary character, the Hope Cup may recall a number of larger mounted objects from the Baroque period, yet exceeds these in the splendorous combination of a plethora of different techniques, colours and pure scale. Juxtaposing sixteenth century style enamelling and shapes with classical cloisonné enamels and innovative colour schemes, Morel's imaginative representation of the story of Perseus and Andromeda was undoubtably as much a theatrical spectacle for the eye at the time of commission as it is now.

The commissioner and first owner of the Hope Vase was the fabulously wealthy Henry Thomas Hope (1808-1862), member of the influential London banking family, who inherited fortunes from both his father and his uncle. Despite his devotion to politics, art was one of the great passions of Henry Thomas Hope who founded the Art Union in London and acted as president of the Society of Arts, as well as the Surrey Archaeological Society. He also welcomed visitors to his London and Surrey residences where his family's significant collection of Old Master paintings was on display.

Moreover, Henry Thomas Hope was the fortunate heir of the blue Hope Diamond, first recorded in London in 1812 and owned by his uncle. It is now located in the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. Hope had agreed to loan the diamond for display to the Great Exhibition of 1851 in Crystal Palace, where he was a member of the governing panel and also had the honour of awarding the council medal to Jean-Valentin Morel which must have boded well for the commission of the Hope Cup two years later.

Henry Thomas Hope's daughter, Henrietta, married in 1861 Henry Pelham Alexander Pelham-Clinton, Earl of Lincoln who in 1864 upon the death of his father became the 6th Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne(1834-1879). Upon the latter's death the title was passed in succession to his two sons, the 7th Duke of Newcastle (1864-1928) and the 8th Duke of Newcastle (1866-1941), also known as Lord Francis Hope.

Lord Francis Hope led an extravagant lifestyle, not helped by his marriage in 1894 to the American actress, May Yohé (1866-1938) who had gained enormous success on the stages in London's West end from 1893. The couple managed to get through their large inheritance in just two years, about which an author for the Bystander later wrote: 'Pecuniary troubles, however large, embarrassed the two but slightly. A future Duke and Duchess can always beg or borrow, and they did' (Bystander Magazine, 1908, p. 11).

Soon after their 1896 bankruptcy, the couple divorced in 1902, by which time Lord Francis was so much in debt that he obtained permission through the courts to break the entail of his inheritances which allowed him to sell the Hope Diamond. May Yohé went on to marry a series of other financially unsuccessful but often adventurous men.

The Hope family treasures, including the magnificent hardstone and enamel Perseus cup, were sold amongst a collection of Hope heirlooms at Christie's on 18 July 1917 for £380, where it was purchased by Brooks. It then came into the possession of another famous dancer, Mrs Frank Isitt,who sold it at Christie's on 5 July 1937 for £1,200.

For the following twenty years, the Hope Cup was in the possession of another famous dancer. Adeline Genée, born Anina Kirstina Margarete Petra Jensen (1878-1970) was a Danish-British ballet dancer. In 1895, she became the principal dancer of the Royal Danish Ballet in Copenhagen and a year later, she danced with the Berlin Royal Opera Ballet and the Munich Opera Ballet. For several years, Genée alternated between a season in London and one in America. On 11 June 1910, Adeline married Frank S.N. Isitt, a wealthy London lawyer, thereafter reducing the frequency of her appearances overseas. When the founder of the Ballets Russes, Sergei Diaghilev (1872-1929) saw Genée dance, he immediately offered her a contract, but she refused. On 3 December 1912 she made her debut at New York's
Metropolitan Opera. Today Adeline Genée remains well known in Great Britain for being one of the founders of the Royal Academy of Dance in London, remaining their president until her retirement in 1954.

After the sale in 1937, the Hope Cup found its way into the collection of the Australian mining multi-millionaire Claude Aldo de Bernales (1876-1963). Twice burglars attempted to steal it (1951 and 1956) from his London mansion, Alton Lodge, Roehampton. The vase was donated for a charity auction in 1969 at the Hartman Galleries in New York in aid of the Police Athletic League and Actors' Youth Fund.

At some point between the record of the attempted burglary in 1956 and the sale at Hartmann Galleries in New York, the Hope Cup belonged to the Duveen collection in New York. Founded by the brothers Joseph (1869-1939) and Henry (1854-1919), who soon became known as the most spectacular British art dealers of all time, the firm made a large portion of their fortune in the States, always in search of the most perfect objet d'art or Old Master painting. Among their wealthy clientele were the most affluent collectors of the time, such as Andrew Mellon, Henry Clay Frick, Joseph E. Widener, Philip Lehman and J.P. Morgan. After Joseph Duveen's death in 1939, his nephew, Armand Lowengard and Edward Fowles assumed leadership of the firms in Paris, New York and London. The Hope Vase was listed as part of the Duveen collection kept at their distinguished New York address at no.720 Fifth Avenue, describing Morel's extraordinary centrepiece as 'the wonder piece of the century' that 'has no equal among the treasures of London'.

While yet again in private hands in the later twentieth century, the Hope Cup was subsequently on loan to various prominent institutions around the world, including the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, The Mitsubishi Ichigokan Museum in Tokyo, Chaumet, and Wartski in London.