A Russian porcelain soup plate from the Raphael Service, Imperial Porcelain Factory, 1892. Centered with a grisaille scene of the classical moon goddess Selene (the Roman goddess Luna) against a grey ground within a shaped cartouche, the outer border of the cavetto with foliate trophies & grotesques against a cream ground, the outer band with a celadon ground against which are circular reserves with grisaille views of cupids swinging on branches against iron red grounds, between these are grisaille views of sea gods & mythical beasts against grey grounds within shaped gilt borders with mastic ornament, the underside with gilt Slavonic cipher of Alexander IIIdated 1892 & gilded foot. Diameter: 9 1/2 in. (24 cm).

Emperor Alexander III specially commissioned the Raphael Service in honor of the 400th anniversary of the Italian painter Raphael Sanzio da Urbino (1483-1520) in 1883. Intended for use in Great Catherine Palace at Tsarskoe Selo, the Raphael service was perhaps the most important service produced at the Imperial Porcelain Manufactory in the late 19th & early 20th centuries. The ornament is derived from motifs in the Hermitage’s Raphael Loggia, which had been copied for Catherine II after frescoes by Raphael & his students in the loggias of the Vatican. The service’s primary decoration alternates panels with human & animal figures interwoven with scrolls & foliage & medallions with antique figures en grisaille set against gray, celadon, iron red, or light blue backgrounds. The project was so complex that Leonard Leonardovich Schaufelberger (1839-1894), head of the factory’s painting workshop, oversaw the designs, & Emperor Alexander III personally approved most of them. Pieces from it are uniquely marked with large, stenciled ciphers of the ruling monarch in tooled gold Slavonic script. The ornately painted service was completed in 1903 after twenty years’ work & included only fifty place settings. The following year, the service was moved to the Anichkov Palace in St. Petersburg for use by the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna. On the service & its history, see T.V. Petrova’s note in Pod tsarskim venzelem, St. Petersburg, 2007, pp. 200-201.