The Fox and The Grapes - Artistic Uses

Artistic Uses

One of La Fontaine's early illustrators was the artist Jean-Baptiste Oudry, who was also artistic director at both the Beauvais and the Gobelins tapestry works. In consequence of this a series based on La Fontaine's fables designed by Oudry was produced by them during the 1740s and included "The Fox and the Grapes". These stayed in production for some forty years and were imitated by other factories in France and abroad, being used not just as wall hangings but for chair covers and other domestic purposes. Furniture craftsmen in France also used the fables as themes and took these with them when they emigrated. Among them was Martin Jugiez (d.1815), who had a workshop in the American city of Philadelphia where the still surviving Fox and Grapes chest of drawers was produced.

The Sèvres porcelain works used the fables on their china as well as reproducing Pierre's Julien's statue from a preliminary model in 1784, even before the finished product was exhibited. Another domestic use for the fable was as an architectural medallion on the outside of mansions, of which there is still an example dating from the turn of the 19th century on the Avenue Felix Fauré in Paris. A medallion of another kind, cast in bronze by Jean Vernon (1897–1975), was produced as part of his renowned series based on the fables in the 1930s. That of "The Fox and the Grapes" features two foxes scrambling up a trellis with what looks like more success than La Fontaine's creation.

There was as diverse a use of the fables in England and from as early a date. Principally this was on domestic china and includes a Chelsea candlestick (1750) and a Worcester jug (1754) in the 18th century; a Brownhills alphabet plate (1888) in the 19th century; and a collector's edition from the Knowles pottery (1988) in the 20th. Series based on Aesop's fables became popular for pictorial tiles towards the end the 19th century, of which Minton Hollins produced a particularly charming example illustrating "The Fox and the Grapes". On this a vixen is accompanied by her cubs, who make ineffectual leaps at the grapes while the mother contemplates them with her paws clasped behind her.

There have also been the following musical settings:

• Louis-Nicolas Clerambault in the early 18th century
• Benjamin Godard, the fifth of his Six Fables de La Fontaine for voice and piano (op. 17 1872-79)
• Louis Lacombe in Fables de La Fontaine, (op. 72 1875)
• Charles Lecocq, the first of his Six Fables de Jean de la Fontaine for voice and piano (1900)
• Mario Versepuy (1882-1972) for voice and piano (1921)
• Marie.Madeleine Duruflé, the third of her 6 Fables de La Fontaine for a capella choir (1960)
• Herbert Callhoff in German translation (1963)
• Ned Rorem, one of the 'five very short operas' in his Fables (1971). A setting of Marianne Moore's translation of La Fontaine, this segment is more a cantata for chorus of two and tenor soloist (representing the fox); its action is all in the programmatic music.
• Andre Asriel, Der Fuchs und die Trauben, the fourth of his 6 Fabeln nach Aesop for mixed a cappella voices (1972).
• Bob Chilcott, among the five English translations in his Aesop's Fables for piano and choir (2008).
• Lefteris Kordis, the eighth of nine compositions for octet and voice in his "Aesop Project" (2010).