Tara Zanardi

Between 1760 and 1765, the Italian sculptor Giuseppe Gricci headed a team of artists in the creation of a Gabinete de Porcelana [Porcelain Room] at the Royal Palace of Aranjuez. Porcelain rooms were not unknown at this time, but Gricci ambitiously tested the limits of porcelain with an exuberant design scheme, an elaborate chinoiserie theme, and nearly three-dimensional deployment of the ceramic medium. The room's innovative technique, which employs porcelain as the framework for the walls and ceiling as well as the medium for the design, is befitting this country estate of King Charles III (r. 1759–88). While the ornamentation offers a rich sensory experience, it also has deliberate political implications and may be read as an idealized expression of Charles III's identity. As a space constructed during the Seven Years' War (1754–63) at the commencement of his reign, the Porcelain Room had both pleasurable and political purposes that allowed the king to forge a modern Bourbon agenda and a modern Bourbon sense of kingship with international scope. The Porcelain Room, like many of Charles's other projects, was created to exemplify the king's opulence while also embodying political messages that promoted his reign and legitimated the Bourbons as the rightful heirs to the Spanish crown.