Georges JOUVE (1910-1964) Free-form sculptural lamp base, circa 1955. Black glazed ceramic proof. Signed "Jouve" and bears the artist's alpha initials on the reverse. Slight defects and a few scattered bubbles. H. 17 cm. Provenance : Gaston Bœuf (1907-1990) collection, decorator. Then by descent. Bibliography: Georges Jouve, Édition Jousse entreprise, 2005, similar model reproduced on p. 287. It was in 1946 that Jouve "made the deep black of such beautiful brilliance fashionable. We have to go back to the Etruscans of the sixth century B.C. to find the comparable "buccero nero", made of clay blackened in the mass by the addition of lampblack. This translucent, shimmering pottery gives the illusion of metal." Michel Faré. But how this black was obtained, his wife Jacqueline explains: "For the black, the enamel was a Paris enamel which was a simple black... It was enamelled quite thickly, just before it ran, well before it was too thick, but as thickly as possible, and then attacked with an acid. We attacked it a little to get a surface that was a little less smooth, well a little rougher, and sometimes we waxed it very lightly, but immediately afterwards with acid because the acid dried it out, so we had to re-wet it a little, but we never told people to wax them, never ever".