It’s a truism that antiques dealers are strangers to retirement; our dear and much missed friend Charlotte Boas famously agreed a ten-year extension on her gallery lease while in her nineties.
We have taken a less extreme path and continue to carefully follow the market and to source items on a commission basis for our regular clients. However a serious dealer has the mindset of a collector and, should we come across an important piece that we find irresistible we have to buy it. Hence the production of an unexpected catalogue, although this time in digital format only.
The greatest joy is in the return of a piece we were reluctant to part with when first sold and there are three such pieces in the catalogue, the archery bowl, which we sold nearly fifty years ago and which I had tried and failed to buy back several times, the companion hunt bowl sold in 2008 and one of the finest ruby backs we have ever owned, sold in 1984.
It was the discovery of the hunt bowl that made me realise that there had to be a workshop, under the auspices of the British East India Company, that continued to produce pieces of exceptional quality long after most workshops were prioritising quantity over quality. This led to further research and an article I wrote for The Magazine Antiques where I named the workshop “The Purple Foliage Workshop” after the unusual purple enamel used in the foliage of much of their production. We have included a version of the article in this catalogue.
Recently we discovered a third European sporting subject bowl that belongs to this group depicting lawn bowls.
As it has taken nearly fifty years to get these three bowls together in one place they will be sold only as a group as they deserve to remain together and, hopefully, on public display.
The piece that fascinates me the most is the portable sundial. Both decorative and well-engineered these were produced in the Imperial workshops and there are examples in The Science Museum, London and the Ernst Collection, Harvard College Observatory.
Other exceptional pieces include the baluster vase with the arms of Sichterman with its very appealing squirrel knop, a painted enamel cup and stand exquisitely enamelled with scenes of Roman mythology, a dish formed of three peonies and probably unique and a nineteenth century blue and white charger very finely painted with a menagerie of animals.
As we had no intention of producing a catalogue, everything here is something we felt compelled to buy and I hope you derive as much pleasure reading about these pieces as we had finding and researching them.
Thanks, as always are due to Will Motley for his diligent research and to my wife and partner Ewa without whom nothing would get done
Michael Cohen November 2025
Saucer Dish
Yongzheng period circa 1730
European Market
Diameter: 7¾ inches; 19.5cm
A fine Chinese eggshell porcelain plate decorated in famille rose enamels with a domestic scene of a lady with three boys playing with rabbits, the border with floral reserves on a pink cell diaper.
Eggshell Plate
Yongzheng period circa 1730
European Market
Diameter: 8½ inches; 21.5cm
Provenance: with Cohen & Pearce, London, 9 July 1984
A fine Chinese eggshell porcelain plate decorated in famille rose enamels with a domestic scene of a lady and three boys, the border with floral reserves on a purple cell diaper ground, the rim with a blue trellis diaper.
References: Williamson 1970, plate XXXIII, an identical example
Eggshell Plate
Yongzheng period circa 1730
European Market
Diameter: 8¼ inches; 21cm
Provenance: old handwritten label to base: “eggshell very finest Beckford sale 41” possibly for William Beckford whose Chinese porcelains was sold over several sales in the 1840s.
A very fine Chinese eggshell porcelain rubyback plate decorated in famille rose enamels with a domestic scene of a lady and three children, a girl and two boys, surrounded by vases and other antiques, the rim with a pink diaper cell pattern with three floral reserves, the reverse of the rim painted in a deep ruby enamel with sgraffito decoration of three roundels on a key fret ground.
This is an exceptionally fine example of this type, painted in the greatest detail. The subject is unusual in having a young girl with two boys.
The sgraffito decoration in the ruby back enamel on the reverse is a remarkable feature. It has been carefully cut to thin the enamel rather than remove it entirely. The technique is known on fine ruby ground Imperial vases but is usually scrolling designs that cut cloers to the white porcelain, as shown here in the small dragon-head roundels.
4 Bowl
Yongzheng period circa 1730
European Market
Diameter: 4½ inches; 11.3cm
Height: 2¼ inches; 5.6cm with script label to base 'C.152',
An eggshell porcelain small bowl decorated in famille rose with a continuous scene of ladies on horseback and a couple in an interior.
Provenance: The Reginald and Lena Palmer Collection, no. C 152; Mallet, London, March 1928, purchased for £53-0-0, as recorded in the RHRPalmer China ledger for C.152.
References: Williamson 1970, plate XX, an identical example
Beaker Vase
Yongzheng period circa 1735
European or Chinese Market
Height: 6¾ inches; 17cm with inventory label 'X 66'
A very rare Chinese porcelain beaker vase painted in famille rose enamels with two European men in conversation, the reverse with a blue rock and foliage.
This is a rare example of such an early type of European subject vase. The style is similar to some of the albums of European figures made for the Imperial court (see three examples illustrated, right) and this could have been made as a curiosity for the Chinese market. The shape is unusual and the sparse decoration lacking any borders would have appealed to Chinese taste at this time.
Provenance: The Reginald and Lena Palmer Collection, listed in the Christie's probate valuation of 1970 and assigned reference number (X) 66 on the death of Lena Florence Palmer in 1981, when it was accepted by HMRC as being of pre-eminent quality and of outstanding national importance.
Reginald Palmer of Hurst Grove, Berkshire, was Chairman of the Palmer and Huntley Biscuit Company in Reading, England, who acquired a substantial and important collection of Chinese ceramics and works of art in the 1920s and 1930s.
Chinese paintings of European figures, on silk, 18th Century,
Pair of Beakers and Saucers
Yongzheng/Qianlong period circa 1735-40
European Market
Diameter of Saucers: 5 inches; 13cm
Height of Beakers: 2¾ inches; 7cm
A pair of beakers and saucers in export eggshell porcelain painted in famille rose enamels with six panels each containing different animals, reserved on a ground of blue Y-diaper and pink fish roe.
Provenance: Collection of W Martin Hurst, (labels to both)
References: Cohen & Cohen 2018, No 6, a single beaker; Williamson 1970, plate X, another.
7
Pair of Chargers
Kangxi period circa 1716-20
Austrian market
Diameter: 12½ inches; 32cm
A previously unrecorded pair of Chinese armorial porcelain dishes with the arms of Prince Eugene of Savoy augmented with the arms of the House of Austria in underglaze blue, the rim gilded.
This pair is an example of this Chinese armorial porcelain, previously unrecorded on Chinese porcelain, having come from the Savoy family. One of them has a label on the back suggesting that it had been through the antiques trade about a hundred years ago and possibly bought back by a member of the family.
The arms, painted in underglaze blue, are of Prince Eugene Franz of Savoy-Carignan (1663-1736) augmented with the arms of Austria, an honour granted around 1700, and with the order of the Golden Fleece around it. Eugene was given this order in 1687 the same year as Joseph I, Archduke of Austria.
With no other decoration the dating is initially difficult but they are likely from around 1716-23 when Eugene was appointed the Governor of the Austrian Netherlands and was building his elegant summer residence at the Belvedere Palaces in Vienna. These dishes may have resided there or at his Winter residence on the Himmelpfortgasse in Vienna.
“Nothing seemed to be too costly, especially when it came to furnishing the Winter Palace and the Belvedere, as testified by reports of admirers. Wall coverings made of silk, precious stones on console tables, chandeliers, ceiling paintings and frescos by famous Italian masters, English silver, Chinese porcelain and much more created a magnificent ambience hardly imaginable today.” (from Prince Eugene’s Winter Palace on Himmelpfortgasse, by Agnes Husslein-Arco, 2013)
Eugene was a younger son of Eugene Moritz of Savoy and Olympia Mancini, a niece of Cardinal Mazarin. His father died in 1673 and Olympia was very intimate with Louis XIV until she was involved in the Affaire des Poisons and was banished from France in 1679.
Eugene was brought up in the court of Louis XIV at Versailles under the neglectful eye of his paternal grandmother Marie Bourbon (1606-1692). Under five feet tall and with a pockmarked face he was a frail and effeminate youth who was originally intended for a clerical role, having no wealth of his own. The Duchess of Orleans, who knew him personally, wrote of him
mezzotint by Petrus Schenck, circa 1706-13, showing Eugene wearing the collar of the order of the Golden Fleece
mezzotint by Petrus Schenck, circa 1706-13, after David Hoyer
portrait of Eugene of Savoy, circa 1718, by Jacob van Schuppen (Rijksmuseum No SK-A-373, on loan at the Belvedere, Vienna)
“his nose ruins his face... he has two large teeth which are visible at all times”, while his “upper lip is so narrow as to prevent him ever shutting his mouth.”. Liselotte von der Pfalz (1652-1722) described him as “nothing but a dirty, very debauched boy who didn’t show any signs of amounting to anything”.
He moved in the circle of the Abbé de Choisy, a well-known transvestite in Paris who was associated with the King’s brother Philippe, Duc d’Orleans. Elizabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate, the The Duchess of Orléans, who had known Eugene from those days, would later write to her aunt, Princess Sophia of Hanover, describing Eugene's antics with lackeys and pages. He was "a vulgar whore" along with the Prince of Turenne, and "often played the woman with young people" with the nickname of 'Madame Simone' or 'Madam l'Ancienne'. He preferred a "couple of fine page boys" to any woman, and was refused an ecclesiastical benefice due to his "depravity".
He never married, and fellow officers referred to him as a "Mars without Venus." Eugene was particularly close to the Marquis de la Moussaye (possibly the exHuguenot René Amaury de Montbourcher).
In 1683 at the age of nineteen Eugene applied to join the French army but Louis XIV personally intervened to disallow him. It is not clear what the King’s reasons were but his effeminacy and transvestism seem to have been at least a contributing factor.
Furious at the French King, Eugene fled France, disguised as a woman, with nothing but the name of an important family and determined to exact revenge upon Louis.
He joined the Austrian army, eventually rising to become of the greatest military commanders of his time - and of all time. Napoleon considered him one of the seven greatest commanders of history.
His military successes against the Turks initially earned him great favour, with an important victory at the Battle of Zenta (1697) that established his military reputation.
Then in the War of the Spanish Succession he defeated the French in several battles at Blenheim (1704), Oudenarde (1708) and Malplaquet (1709). This last, involving over three hundred thousand troops, was the bloodiest battle of the eighteenth century in which the forces of Eugene and his ally the Duke of Marlborough lost twice as many men as the French but were ultimately victorious.
His victories against Louis XIV no doubt brought him pleasure and certainly underlined the French King’s limited view of a warrior’s appearance.
Upper Belvedere Palace, Vienna
detail of amorial cartouche above the main entrance to Upper Belvedere Palace
engraving circa 1720 by Gerard Valck (1651-1726) portrait of Eugene
detail
allegorical
of
armorial print, 1719, by Bernard Picart (Rijksmuseum, No RP-P-OB-57.082)
Later campaigns included the Austro-Turkish War 1716-18 and the War of the Polish Succession after the death of Augustus the Strong in 1733.
In his memoirs he mentions a visit in 1728 with Charles VI of Austria to Trieste. “I was of the party and should have been heartily tired but for Prince Francis of Lorraine, who was extremely amiable, handsome, only twenty years of age, and gay as his little court of Lorraine.” (Francis later married Empress Maria Theresa of Austria in 1736 and their youngest daughter was Marie Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI of France).
He remained a loyal friend to Marlborough and visited London to support him in 1712 when Marlborough fell out of favour with Queen Anne.
Despite his rather uncertain start he came to embody the enlightenment ideal of the honnête homme as described in the writings of de la Rochefoucauld and Pascal and characterised by a stoic self-control, courage, wisdom and education.
Eugene was a great patron of the arts and built and decorated the Winter Palace and the complex at Belvedere in Vienna where he had a major art collection. He had a library of over 15,000 books and prints and was acquainted with Leibniz, Rousseau and Montesquieu. "It is hardly believable," wrote Rousseau, "that a man who carries on his shoulders the burden of almost all the affairs of Europe … should find as much time to read as though he had nothing else to do."
Eugene died in 1736 and his estates were left to his niece who sold them immediately. His art was bought by a relative, Charles Emmanuel III, Duke of Savoy and King of Sardinia and his library was purchased by the Archduke of Austria, in 1737, and is now in the Austrian National Collection.
Winston Churchill (a descendant of the Duke of Marlborough) described Eugene as “disdainful of money, content with his bright sword and his lifelong animosities against Louis XIV”.
An anonymous writer in 1718 said of him: “It was by passing through every imaginable vice that he succeeded in acquiring the character of an honorable man.”
8
Armorial Charger
Kangxi period circa 1716-20
Austrian market
Diameter: 14 inches; 36cm
A previously unrecorded Chinese armorial porcelain dish with the arms of Prince Eugene of Savoy augmented with the arms of the House of Austria in underglaze blue, the rim and cavetto densely decorated in famille verte enamels with flowers and leaves.
En suite with the previous item.
These three pieces are the only recorded examples of these arms on Chinese export porcelain.
signature of Eugene de Savoye
Vase & Cover
Qianlong period circa 1736-45
Dutch Market
Height: 25¾ inches; 65.5cm
A large baluster vase and cover, decorated in underglaze blue and white with flowers and cell diapers, with an armorial cartouche in sepia, iron red, green enamel and gilding, the cover with a finial modelled as a squirrel holding a green leaf.
Provenance: Wolf Family Collection No. 0905: Sotheby's Monaco, June 22, 1987, lot 1453; Mottahedeh Collection (No 850).
This vases was part of an extensive group of porcelains made for Jan Albert Sichterman (1692-1764) in the late 1730s.
Sichterman was born in Groningen, son of the soldier Galenus Sichterman and Margaretha Celosse. He initialy joined his father in the military but he fought a duel in 1715, killing his opponent. After this he joined the VOC, arriving in Batavia in 1716 before moving to Bengal eventually becoming Director of Bengal in 1734. He successfully used his position to become extremely wealthy and his Chinese armorial porcelain is particularly fine and elaborate with a wide range of unusual shapes like this vase with its finely modelled squirrel.
He returned to the Netherlands in 1745, bringing back his armorial porcelain with him. In Groningen he built a large house, the Sichtermanhuis at Ossenmarkt, which still stands today.
In Bengal in 1738 Sichterman was presented with a month old rhinoceros calf that had been orphaned by hunters. He adopted the rhino until she was grown, allowing her to wander freely around his residence. In 1741 she was acquired by a VOC ship’s captain and arrived in Rotterdam. Named Clara, she became a huge celebrity touring Europe, painted by Longhi and Oudry among others and eventually dying in 1758 in Lambeth in London. Her biography appeared in 2005 by Glynis Ridley, Clara’s Grand Tour: Travels with a Rhinoceros in Eighteenth-Century Europe
References: Kroes, Jochem (2007), Chinese Armorial Porcelain for the Dutch Market, the Sichterman armorial services described: pp. 127-130 and pp. 200-202, where a teapot with similar underglaze-blue decoration to this vase is illustrated, p. 201, cat. no. 115 (Kroes calls this decoration ‘Sichterman 2B); Jörg, Christiaan J.A. (1985), Jan Albert Sichterman. A Groninger Nabob and Art-collector. Itinerario. 9 (2): 178–195; Jörg (1982), p. 357; Howard and Ayers (1978), Vol. II, p. 401, no. 399, this vase illustrated; Beurdeley, Michael (1962), p. 194, cat. 191, a bowl in the Muséee Guimet, Paris, with the arms wrongly attributed to the French family of Foucquet (fouquet = squirrel) whose arms have a standing squirrel; Lunsingh Sheurleer (1966) plates 101-102, two vases with iron red decoration; https://www.groningermuseum.nl/en/art/exhibitions/king-of-groningen (exhibition 2014-2015; about Jan Albert Sichterman, including a five piece garniture of vases with these arms and squirrel knops but with iron red decoration.)
Jan Albert Sichterman with sons Jan Albert and Gerritt Jan, c. 1745, by Philip van Dijk (1683-1753)
Clara, the rhinoceros, that travelled throughout Europe in the mid-18th century. Engraving by Elias Baeck from 1746
Armorial Charger
Qianlong period circa 1740
Scottish Market
Diameter: 15 inches; 38.5cm
A Chinese porcelain charger with a finely painted grisaille scene after a 1737 print, La Fontaine de Bacchus engraved by Jean Moyreau (1690-1762) after a painting by Philips Wouwerman (1619-1668); the underside with a coat of arms attributed to Robert French of Frenchland.
The print by Jean Moyreau is titled The Fountain of Bacchus but the painting it is after, by Philips Wouwerman, is usually known as The Return from the Hunt. The original painting is now in the Dresden Staatliche Kunstsammlunge and the print is from about 1737-1739 as part of an extensive suite by Moyreau of the works of Wouwermans. The grisaille enameling by the Chinese artist is of exceptional quality and the use of the original print is extremely sophisticated, relocating some of the foreground elements to better fit the circular canvas of the porcelain dish.
Only five other such chargers are recorded: two in the British Museum, with a biblical and a mythological scene, and three with flowers after Monnoyer, two in the Metropolitan Museum, New York and another in the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts.
All these dishes have different images on them - which would have been very expensive to commission in Canton. This is most unusual for Chinese export porcelains with Western or European Subject designs like this. Normally the whole teaservice or set of plates would have just one image reproduced many times. Some sets of two or four are known but it is very rare by comparison with many European ceramic services which might have many different scenes from a suite of prints.
The order for these dishes and another linked set of bird and animal dishes, all painted in very high quality grisaille, are likely from a single workshop in Canton and the venture to produce such high quality works for export is comparable in some ways to the better known Pronk venture which was underway at the same time.
The coat of arms has been attributed by David Howard (1974) to Robert French of Frenchland and Thornydykes in Scotland but there is no evidence of the order or of other art collecting that might suggest that this man was behind the creation of these spectacular porcelains. In the literature these are therefore linked with Robert French but it should be noted that several other families in Britain and the Low Countries bore very similar arms, some of whom had sufficient wealth to order such a set but there is no evidence linking any of them with this set. Some other porcelains are known with these arms (see right) and the style of the arms certainly looks more British than Continental.
Little is known about Robert French (1705-1758), the son of David French MP (d.1720) of Frenchland and Thornydykes. David was an MP for New Galloway in the Scottish parliament of 1702 and he had been granted substantial lands in Scotland in 1707. He married three times, with his second wife Elizabeth Thomsone (d. 1712) being Robert’s mother. David died with his estates in a poor state and they were eventually sold by his heir Robert in 1730. Robert moved to London and made a considerable fortune in commerce. He married Elizabeth Hull (1709-56), daughter of Christopher Hull of Brampton, and their only daughter Elizabeth (1746-1813) married John Wallace of Sidcup in Kent.
References: Cunha Alves, 2016, p292, No 180, charger of the same size with flowers, en grisaille, but without the gilding, no arms on underside; Cohen & Cohen 2014b, Hit & Myth, p86, No49, a 23cm dinner plate with Achilles; another 23cm plate with Achilles is in the Victoria & Albert Museum (No C.76-1963); Le Corbeiller 1974, ppp71-5, the two plates in the NY Met NY and discussion of the Monnoyer sources; Sargent 2012, p364, the Peabody example.
opposite page, bottom, print circa 1737, La Fontaine de Bacchus, engraved by Jean Moyreau (1690-1762) after a painting by Philips Wouwerman (1619-1668) (Author’s Collection)
armorial dinner plate with detail, left, of the arms of Robert French on the rim, Qianlong period circa 1740
Robert
The Robert French Chargers (c 1740) from a set with the Arms of Robert French on the underside
A: flowers, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem (38.5cm)
B,C: flowers, Metropolitan Museum, NY (both 38.5cm)
D,E: figures, British Museum, London (both 42cm)
F: figures, with Cohen & Cohen (38.5cm)
Six Chargers are known with different elaborate grisaille and gilt decoration to the front and a coat of arms in the well of the foot rim, painted in famille rose. Three of these have baskets of flowers with reombined compositions taking elements from the prints of Jean Baptiste Monnoyer, and three have complete scenes taken from prints, two by Edmé Jeaurat (1688–1738), one of Achilles being Dipped in the River Styx (1719) after a lost painting by Nicolas Vleughels and the other of The Triumph of Mordecai (1737) after Sébastien Leclerc the Younger (1676-1763) and the third La Fontaine de Bacchus (1737) by Jean Moyreau (1690-1762) after Philips Wouwerman (1619-1668).
This last, published here for the first time, has only recently been discovered, emerging from a private collection in Europe. It can be hoped that more will appear as the set was likely larger than the extant examples.
‘Bird and Animals’ Chargers (c
1740)
Six plates (A, B, C, D, E, F): Zeeuws Museum, Middleburg
One plate (G): previously in the Mottahedeh Collection and the Popowich Collection, sold January 2017 Christie’s New York
Two plates (H, I): the Metropolitan Museum, New York
Two Plates (J, K): the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem (all examples 28cm)
One Plate (L): the Cunha Alves Collection. The ‘link’ example (35.5cm)
The birds on these porcelains have been assembled from a range of prints mainly by Nicolas Robert and Francis Barlow but also some from Jan Griffier, Pieter Boel, Francis Place and Johannes Teyler.
Three (C,D,G) are taken straight from a single print but the others take elements from different prints to create new compositions.
The compositions of some of these relate directly to a very rare series of bird prints by Jean Mariette (1660-1742) that are in the British Museum (Nos 1914,0520.733 to 741). From a numbered series of at least eight, though only five are in the BM, these Mariette prints take elements of the Nicolas Robert birds from all three of his series of published bird prints. The BM examples, which are the only ones located so far, are from the original collection of Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820).
Remarkably these examples have pencil lines through some of the birds in Mariette’s compositions - and when compared with the design on the porcelain these birds are not included (see the pictorial analysis of plate H). This suggests the plates might also have belonged to Banks along with the prints and that either they are the prints actually sent to China for the order and returned with the plates - or they are a later comparison with the plates, possibly by Banks himself. Banks also possessed a Chinese export armorial service with his arms painted en grisaille (see a pair of loving cups in the British Museum, No 1887,1218.7) and his widow Dorothy had an extensive collection of Chinese porclain, though these do not appear among any descriptions of that collection.
The plate with the bear hunt (K) is also a recombined design but appears to take most of its elements from a 1639 painting by Rubens and Frans Snyder for the Alcazár, Philip IV’s royal palace in Madrid. The palace was destroyed by fire but copies exist and Rubens’ oil sketch also survives in The Cleveland Museum of Art (No. 1983.69).
The six known Robert French Armorial chargers relate to another set of bird and animal designs, also with very high quality decoration without any decorative borders, apart from a gold rim, and the set is made up of different designs rather than the customary repetition of a single design on all the pieces. Thus it has been assumed that these pieces were all produced in the same workshop, in a single complex order supervised by one agent, though possibly for more than one client. The second group is not of quite the same quality as the armorial group.
The ‘flowers’ of the Robert French group have extensive gilding over the grisaille painting which is also unusual. One charger in particular links these two groups, having the same floral composition as found on one of the armorial chargers but painted in the same grisaille style as the bird chargers, lacking the extra gilding.
Both series use the works of artists associated with Versailles in the second half of the seventeenth century: Monnoyer, Robert, Boel and Barlow all worked producing drawings of animals in the Menagerie at Versailles, first under Gaston, Duc d’Orléans, brother of Louis XIII, and then for Philippe, Duc d’Orléans, brother of Louis XIV.
The two armorial chargers in the British Museum with figural designs use prints by Edmé Jeaurat, the elder brother of the more famous Etienne. Edmé was apprenticed to Bernard Picart and worked in the Netherlands for some time before returning to France and establishing a reputation producing accurate engravings of paintings, particularly for the collector Pierre Crozat (1665–1740). The Achilles engraving is dated 1719 and the Mordecai is dated 1737, the same year as the Moyreau print after Wouwermans.
One of the recombined Monnoyer designs (C) is also on the dish L and the Achilles design is found on a small number of dinner plates, without the arms of French on the underside, both slightly different from the original set. These may have been trials or made at the same time to be sold independently, to offset the expense of setting up the production.
The discovery of the connection with Jean Mariette is interesting as he had also re-engraved some of the Barlow barnyard prints including two found on the porcelain - and these have the correct orientation for the porcelain.
So it is possible that Mariette also created the Monnoyer recombinant designs and he, or possibly his son Pierre-Jean Mariette, a wealthy collector and connoisseur, might have been involved in the orders for the porcelain.
Further research is underway.
A pictorial analysis of one of the bird plates (H) with Jean Mariette’s composition and the sources of some of the birds from the work of Nicolas Robert. Note the three birds circled which are not found on the porcelain. Similar analysis has been done for plates A, E and F.
a pictorial analysis of the various floral details used in the compositions found on the porcelain. The images shaded in purple are known prints from works by Monnoyer, most from an album in the Rijksmuseum
Teabowl and Saucer
Yongzheng/Qianlong period 1735-40
Dutch Market
Diameter of Saucer: 4½ inches; 11.5cm
A rare Chinese export porcelain teabowl and saucer decorated en grisaille with a Dutch topographical scene, the rim with simple gilt border.
This scene shows the mansion at Roosendaal in South Holland. It matches one of the three border panels on a well known armorial service made for Adriaan Valckenier (1695-1751) who was resident in Batavia from 1715 and rose through the VOC to become Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies (1737-41) (see images of the border panels below).
The image closely copies a small print, dated 1727, by Abraham Zeeman (1695-1754) from Kleefsche and Zuid-Hollandsche Arkadia by Claas Bruin (Pub: Evert Visscher, Amsterdam, 1730) with many engravings by Abraham Zeeman, this one dated 1727. Here the Chinese artist has misread the reflection of the building the castle moat and drawn a brickwork walkway.
1727 print by Abraham Zeeman (16951754) from Kleefsche and Zuid-Hollandsche Arkadia by Claas Bruin (Pub: Evert Visscher, Amsterdam, 1730)
(Author’s Collection)
1727-30 print by Abraham Zeeman (16951754) from Kleefsche and Zuid-Hollandsche Arkadia by Claas Bruin (Pub: Evert Visscher, Amsterdam, 1730)
This scene and the two others have been shown to be related to the Valkenier family explaining their selection from Bruin’s book. At least two teaservies with this scene were made, one with a gilt laub und bandelwerk border is mostly still at Roosendaal castle, the other like this example is dispersed. Another teaservice with the Valkenburg scene and gilt floral border is also recorded, an example was with The Chinese Porcelain Company in 1995. The third scene of Cleves is not known on a teaservice.
References: Hester Valckenier Kips (2020) Valckenieren, Fonteinen en Forten, Vormen uit Vuur 244, October 2020, p8-15 where the author reveals the connection of the three scenes on the border of the armorial plates with the Valckenier family and illustrates another teaservice with the view of Valkenburg; Kroes 2007, p134, Cat XX, the service with border panels, p646, Appendix 1G, a list of all the Valckenier services; Cleveland Art Museum, No 1961.193a&b a teabowl and saucer from this teaservice.
(Author’s Collection) Roosendaal
1727 print by Abraham Zeeman (1695-1754) from Kleefsche and Zuid-Hollandsche Arkadia by Claas Bruin (Pub: Evert Visscher, Amsterdam, 1730) (Author’s Collection)
Valkenburg
Cleves
Painted Enamel Footed Bowl & Saucer
Qianlong period circa 1750-60
European or Chinese Market
Diameter of Saucer: 5¾ inches; 14.6cm
An extremely fine Chinese painted enamel on copper footed cup and saucer decorated with panels of European mythological subjects on a dense floral ground.
This example belongs to a small group of such pieces of exceptional quality. These were most likely made in the Beijing enamelling workshops rather than in Canton.
The design sources for these pieces are not fully understood though some have now been established and they seem to come from a range of subjects including mythological, pastoral and religious prints, freely combined on the cups and saucers.
A similar bowl and saucer with Cohen & Cohen (2017, Cat 16) has a scene of Moses and the Tablets with the Worship of the Golden Calf, after a print by Matthaus Merian the Elder. Other examples have the Visitation of the Virgin Mary to St Elizabeth, two pastoral fêtes galantes, three scenes of shepherd boys with animals and variations of the three mythogical subjects seen on this example.
The three scenes here are also recorded on Chinese export porcelain in famille rose and en grisaille. The scene of Vertumnus and Pomona is recorded on two
teaservices and the other two scenes are found on plates with some examples combining both of them into a single composition which may be the original image.
The image of Vertumnus and Pomona is taken from a 1732 print, engraved by Edmé Jeaurat (1688-1738) after a painting by his younger brother Étienne Jeaurat (1699-1789), Vertumnus & Pomona. This was copied slightly later ‘à Paris chez Crépy etc.’ (Jean Crépy c16601739) which is reversed and has the correct orientation for the bowl. The reclining figure of Cupid has been changed to a couple of hounds in this example but in other examples the Cupid remains. In the foreground of the print is a small pile of fruit which has inspired the decoration around the foot of the bowl.
The scene on the saucer here is traditionally described as Cybele in a chariot but that may not be accurate. Similar images are recorded in prints showing the goddess Ceres, in a chariot drawn by lions, being offered thanks for the harvest. The composition is similar to a frontispiece drawn and engraved in 1723 by Jan Caspar Philips (1690–1775) for a 1726 collected edition of the poems of Jeremias de Decker (1609-1666) published in Amsterdam but a precise source has not been found.
References: an identical bowl and saucer is in the Victoria & Albert Museum No. C 39-1962; a similar example is in the Philadephia Museum of Art; a porcelain example is in the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts formerly with Cohen & Cohen.
1732 engraving by Edmé Jeaurat (16881738) after a painting by his younger brother Étienne Jeaurat (1699-1789), Vertumnus & Pomona
[Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, Germany - CC BY-NC-SA]
detail, Vertumnus & Pomona
This example a slightly later copy unsigned and published chez Crepy, Paris and reversed, matching the designs on copper and porcelain. (Author’s collection)
detail of centre of Chinese export porcelain saucer (private collection)
drawn and engraved in 1723 by Jan Caspar Philips (1690–1775) for a 1726 collected edition of the poems of Jeremias de Decker (16091666) published in Amsterdam. (Author’s Collection)
painted enamel snuff box lid with the same design but including the reclining infant cupid on the ground
(image Woolley & Wallis, Salisbury, UK)
details of centres of two Chinese export porcelain dinner plates
Dish
Yongzheng period circa 1730
European Market
Diameter: 8½ inches; 22cm
An extremely rare Chinese moulded porcelain small plate decorated all over in famille rose enamels as three peonies in pink, purple and yellow.
This remarkable plate is of an unrecorded type and of exceptional quality. It is difficult to be certain whether this was intended for export or for the Chinese market as it would have appealed to both.
Late Bloomers
The Purple Foliage Workshop by
Michael Cohen
(This is a revised version of an article that appeared in the The Magazine Antiques in 2013)
The second quarter of the 18th century is thought of as the golden age of Chinese export porcelain, and with good reason. This is the period just following the introduction of the famille rose enamel; a period of innovation and experimentation when European porcelain manufacture was in its infancy and Europe was crying out for the very best that the Chinese enamellers could offer.
Accepted wisdom is that quality dropped in subsequent years; the European factories had developed and were now providing the market with porcelains of the highest quality and, with production so close to the final consumer, the cost of distribution was considerably less than for the Chinese competition. The Chinese now had to compete on price, and speed of production became more important than quality of production. The designs became simpler and the enamels less lustrous due to the use of opacifiers which allowed the enamels to be used more thinly.
As a young dealer in the 1970s, possessed of little wisdom, accepted or otherwise, I came across a Chinese export bowl with enamelling of such quality and artistic integrity that it became one of my first “have to have it at any cost” purchases. The decoration was of archers in European dress, apparently uniform, at practice. The enamels were bright and the draughtsmanship was better than anything I had seen previously on a Chinese export piece and yet the style of border suggested a late eighteenth century date, as did the clothing of the archers. (Item 14 in this catalogue).
I sold the bowl, too quickly, to a New York dealer buying for a client, but not before I had run off a whole roll of film as a memento of an extraordinary find. The photographs went into a drawer and, although the bowl was fondly remembered I grew to think of it as a one off, an exception to the rule that quality of this calibre was not produced in the late eighteenth century. Until, that is, I was viewing a general auction in the USA in 2007 and a bowl caught my eye. This was a European foxhunt scene, not a particularly rare type but, in this case, exceptional. As I was examining the bowl I was joined by the dealer to whom I had sold the archery
bowl thirty years earlier. The first words we said to each other, spoken simultaneously, were, “Same workshop!”
At this point it became clear that there must have been an enamelling workshop in Canton that employed exceptional artists and was able to take on special orders. We started to scour reference books and auction catalogues for other examples of their work, seeking out pieces where the perceived quality did not tie in with the date of production.
We bought the hunt bowl, which featured in our 2008 catalogue. (Now item 16 in this catalogue).
The design was from an engraving by the French artist Pierre Charles Canot (1710-1777)after a painting by James Seymour (1702-1752) and the Chinese artist has moved the buildings to the left in order to create an image that successfully goes all around the bowl. Interestingly the Chinese artist has misinterpreted one of the riders who, in the original, is looking down towards the hounds, his black jockeys hat redrawn as a black face. The idea of painting a figure while the face was not visible would have been alien to a Chinese artist. This also suggests a later generation copy of the print with some detail lost was used as the source material.
The figure in the turquoise jacket, mounted on a grey horse and with his back to the viewer, is Sir William Joliffe, MP for Petersfield a patron of James Seymour who hosted the hunt. The style of the floral border on the inner rim dates this bowl to the 1770s.
This scene also appears on an earlier bowl (Fig 1) and the difference in quality and draughtsmanship between the standard bowl and the later example from the mystery workshop is plain.
Both the archery and the hunt bowl have two defining features that, apart from the sheer quality, suggest a common source. The first is the spread of the foliage on most of the trees, which is far looser than is
typical on Chinese export bowls. The second is the use of violet enamel in the foliage. This is a difficult colour to achieve requiring a high firing temperature and great control of the firing process, reinforcing the quality of production. Although this colour was commonly used on hunt bowls the variety of shades and purity of colour on this hunt bowl is truly exceptional.
In the spring of 2013 I was talking to a specialist in Chinese porcelain. He was describing a fantastic famille rose bowl that he had just acquired and was sure that, due to the quality of enamelling, it had to be Yongzheng period and circa 1730. As he described the bowl I knew we had found our third piece from the mystery workshop, as the design he described was not commensurate with the Yongzheng period. I reserved the bowl there and then.
Unlike the previous two bowls this is a Chinese subject, showing figures in a landscape. The date on this bowl is similar to that of the hunt bowl, the gilt scroll border on the foot dating it to the 1770s. (Fig 2)
As with the previous bowls the enamelling is exceptional. The design is arranged in such a way that it fills the bowl in a most satisfactory fashion. The foliage on the trees is well spread and there are hints of violet amongst the greenery.
No sooner had I got over my excitement at acquiring this bowl than I received another call from somebody with a bowl for sale. He described a subject I had not seen before, a mounted hunter with two pointers cornering a hare beneath a bush. It was not long before I had seen and purchased the bowl to add to the other in our current catalogue. (Fig. 3)
This bowl is stylistically earlier than the other examples and dates to circa 1755. At the time of purchase, I had not connected it to the mystery workshop but, when we were photographing it for the catalogue, I began to notice the familiarity of the colour palette, the ambition
of the artist in painting the horse and rider facing forward rather than in profile, the wide spread of the tree in the background and the clincher, the use of purple in the foliage. The source for this bowl is “The Pointers and the Hare” (Fig 4) a mezzotint by Thomas Burford after a James Seymour painting and the publication date of 1753/4 agrees with the dating by style of 1755. As with the hunt bowl (also after a Seymour painting) the design has been altered slightly and optimised for reproduction on a bowl. I was convinced that we had an early example of our workshop, now christened “The Purple Foliage Workshop”
It seems probable that all of these bowls were special orders at a premium price. In forty years (up to 2013), I had seen only four bowls that meet all the criteria for inclusion in the group yet, for it to survive commercially the workshop must have had an output far greater than this.
fig. 3
fig. 4
fig. 2
The only example of these bowls that could conceivably be traced to a special order is the archery bowl. The fact that the archers had a common uniform suggests an association.
There was a revival of archery in the 1780s attributed to two men, Sir Ashton Lever and his secretary Thomas Waring who formed The Toxophilite Society in 1781. Waring looked back to mediaeval England when every yeoman was obliged to practise archery and the strength of the English archers was legendary. He promoted the revived sport for its health benefits describing it as the most healthy exercise a man can pursue, strengthening and bracing the bodily frame, without that laborious exertion common to many games (A Treatise on Archery, 1814).
For most people it was the romance of archery, its connection to the legend of Robin Hood and the glory of Agincourt that fired their enthusiasm in the revived sport. When, in 1787, The Prince of Wales agreed to become patron of the Toxophilite Society, the sport’s future seemed assured and archery societies sprang up nationwide to follow the fashion set by the Prince. By 1787 an elaborate set of rules had been devised for the renamed Royal Toxophilite Society and those who were admitted had to furnish themselves not only with a bow and arrows but also with the Society’s uniform. This comprised a green single-breasted coat trimmed with gold buttons, worn over a white waistcoat and breeches and topped off by a hat, turned up over one eye, from which a single black feather sprouted.
Although some liberties have been taken with the colours, the Chinese bowl clearly illustrates this uniform and would almost certainly have been a special order by the Society or one of its members to commemorate the patronship of the Prince of Wales in 1787, probably depicting the Annual Target Day held on the Prince of Wales’s birthday.
This ties in perfectly with the dating of the bowl by its border designs
Returning to our search for further production of “The Purple Foliage Workshop” several other designs stand out as being likely contenders.
The first is a depiction of a passage from the novel “Don Quixote” by Cervantes, in which Don Quixote puts on a barber’s bowl as the Helmet of Mambrino after an image by Charles-Antoine Coypel (1694-1752) originally for the Gobelins tapestry factory, engraved by Jacob Folkema (1692-1767) and Gerard van der Gucht (1696-1776) (Fig 12)
Two services exist and the tradition is the first, both more complete and more elaborate, was produced around 1745 and the second, a simplified version, around five years later.
The ‘first’ service (Fig 5) has an unusual colour palette and shows great detail with much higher artistic values than the second, which employs a more conventional palette. The borders on the ‘first’ service are an inner chain border and an outer border of flower heads linked by gilt scrolls, with floral sprays between the two. The border on the ‘second’ service (Fig 6) is of four Meissen style cartouches, containing landscapes and birds en grisaille
Because of the usual assumption that quality decreases the later one looks into the eighteenth century this dating has not been challenged but, once again, the borders tell a different story. The Meissen style border is similar to that on a famous plate depicting two Scottish soldiers and dating to 1745 whereas the chain border is not known to appear prior to 1755 and is most commonly seen on services dating from 1760 to 1770. Thus our assumptions are turned upside down and the higher quality service is the later of the two.
The hare hunt bowl suggests that the workshop was producing as early as 1755 and the later Don Quixote service falls comfortably after this date. An examination of the enamels used shows the violet/purple enamel is used in the grass in the foreground and together with the degree of detail and accuracy of the draughtsmanship provides a strong case for this being another product of The Purple Foliage Workshop.
Another design is another, larger, hunt bowl of slightly later date than the other pieces that appeared in our catalogue of 2007. The underglaze blue border is typical of late in the last quarter of the eighteenth century yet this bowl shows exceptional draughtsmanship well beyond that typical of earlier hunt bowls and this is coupled with superb composition and an interesting colour palette that includes, once again, the tell tale purple foliage. (Fig 7)
Although I have held the bowl and have had the images on my computer for a number of years I had not considered it as a product of this workshop because
it is a known type and, although not common, is seen with a great deal more frequency than the other examples I have shown. However, as I stated previously, the workshop must have had a substantial degree of regular production in order to survive and production of this quality at so late a date and also demonstrating the use of the purple enamel in the foliage makes this a strong candidate for inclusion in the output of The Purple Foliage Workshop.
The pieces described above are, in the main, depictions of English field sports and of literary references popular in England at this time. This leads to the conclusion that The Purple Foliage Workshop worked under the auspices of the Honourable East India Company in Canton, could undertake special commissions and was capable of enamelling and draughtsmanship of an exceptional standard.
The years 1745-1795 represent the last forty years of the reign of the Qianlong Emperor, the period that supposedly signalled the decline of skill and artistry in the enamelling of porcelain. Although this decline in quality is undeniable, clearly there was one workshop that bucked the trend and produced work that equalled and, in some cases, exceeded the quality of what had come before.
Michael Cohen
fig. 7
details of two prints, 1787, by Thomas Rowlandson. It is thought that one of the figures in each of these is the Prince of Wales, later George IV.
Punch Bowl
Qianlong period circa 1785-90
English Market
Diameter: 11½ inches; 29cm
An extremely rare Chinese porcelain punch bowl decorated in famille rose enamels with a continuous scene of men playing lawn bowls.
The quality of the painting and the enamelling indicates that this bowl is made in the same workshop as the next two bowls. In particular this would appear to belong with the Royal Toxophilite Society bowl, having the same borders and overall style and is the same size.
Lawn bowls were popular in the late 18th century, often associated with dining and drinking, but largely unregulated and rules varied from place to place.
No source for this image has been found. There are not many images of this sport from the 18th Century, though one that survives has similarities to this scene.
References: Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, No 4.1, this bowl.
Balthasar Nebot (1730–1765)
The Bowling Green and the Octagon Pond, Hartwell House (Buckinghamshire County Museum)
Small Punch Bowl
Qianlong period circa 1787-90
English Market
Dimensions: 11½ inches; 29cm
An extremely rare Chinese export porcelain punch bowl decorated in famille rose with a continuous scene of an archery contest, the figures in green coats.
This remarkable bowl shows a meeting of the the Royal Toxophilite Society, painted in astonishing quality. It was likely made as a special commission to celebrate the Prince of Wales (later King George IV) becoming the Patron of the Society in 1787.
The Toxophilite Socity was founded in 1781 by Sir Ashton Lever and Thomas Waring, superintendent of Lever’s Museum in Leicester House, London. Waring had taken up the sport to help with back problems.
The society had a distinctive green uniform and after 1787 wore a medal in their hats with the Prince of Wales feathers, seen here in the central figure, thought to show Thomas Waring himself. This pose is also found on Waring’s bills of sale and reproduced later in books on archery.
print by William Darling (c1737-1799)
William Darling (c1737-1799), Bill-head of Thomas Waring, manufacturer of bows and arrows at Charlotte Street, Bloomsbury, London.
Small Punch Bowl
Qianlong period circa 1770-80
English Market
Diameter: 11½ inches (29cm)
An extremely rare hunting punchbowl, painted with a continuous scene of a hunt meet after an engraving by PC Canot, following a painting by James Seymour, the inner rim with a border of flowers and a central image of a single huntsman on horseback.
This bowl has enamelling of a very high quality, which is comparable with that on the previous two bowls, suggesting that they were from the same workshop. English hunting scenes were popular on Chinese export porcelain and this scene is known on others, in conjunction with different hunting scenes.
The scene here is taken from a print by French artist Pierre-Charles Canot (1710-1777) after a painting by James Seymour (1702-1752), showing a hunt meet outside a garden wall with an orangery or gazebo. In order to create an image all round the bowl the composition has been altered slightly - the wall and buildings have been moved to the left. Interestingly the Chinese painters have misinterpreted one of the riders, in the original he is looking down at a hound, but his black jockey cap has been redrawn here as a black face. The interior of the bowl has a single huntsman with a horn who is taken from the rider on the extreme right of the main image.
Among Seymour’s patrons was Sir William Jolliffe MP for Petersfield, whose hunt was depicted by him in at least two paintings, of which this is one. Both are known together on other bowls. The figure in the turquoise coat on the grey horse, with his back to the viewer, is Sir William Jolliffe, as he is the focus of attention.
The buildings could be part of Petersfield House. It was extensively remodelled by Sir William’s nephew John in the 1730’s with a Grange, dairies and outbuildings, the architect was John James of Greenwich who also built Standlynch Park, which has windows very similar to the one in this image - Petersfield House was demolished in 1793 when the family moved to Merstham near Reigate and no drawings of it survive. The church with square steeple could be Harting Church, which it resembles and is to the south east of Petersfield.
References: Brawer 1992, p117, No 90, a different bowl with prints after Seymour; Howard 1997, No 144 a bowl with this and other images; Howard & Ayers 1978, p281-3, No 280, another bowl, after Seymour images; Lloyd Hyde 1964, Colour Plate B, a bowl; Phillips 1956, p141, pl 59, a bowl with different images after Seymour; Cohen & Cohen 2007, p54, No 32 another bowl (see right); Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, p74, No 3.23, this bowl; Du Boulay 1973, p92, this bowl.
Going Out in the Morning engraving by Pierre Charles Canot (1710-1777) after a painting by James Seymour (1702-1752), published Robert Sayer, (this example a smaller version also published by Robert Sayer in a set of twelve circa 1770)
Reverse Glass Painting
Qianlong period circa 1775-80
European Market
Dimensions: 12½ inches x 10½ inches; 31.5cm x 26.5cm
Provenance: with J Sparks, London 1960.
A fine Chinese export reverse glass painting of an interior scene, La Confidence from an engraving by by JacquesFirmin Beauvarlet (1731-1797) after Charles-André Van Loo (1705-1765).
The original painting by Van Loo appears lost but it relates to another painted around 1747 of a lady in Turkish dress being served coffee, thought to show Madame de Pompadour. This example also has the ladies dressed à la Turque which was very fashionable at this time.
La Confidence, engraving circa 1775 by Jacques-Firmin Beauvarlet (1731-1797) after Charles-André Van Loo (1705-1765) (Author’s Collection)
Reverse Glass Painting
Qianlong period circa 1773-80
European Market
Dimensions: 14 inches x 19¾ inches; 36cm x 50cm
A very fine Chinese reverse glass painting of a mother and child with a small dog.
The subject is La Fécondité by François Boucher (1703-1770) engraved by René Gaillard (17191790) in 1773 and advertised with its pair, Les Sabots, in the 'Gazette de France' and 'L'Avant Coureur' (9 August 1773) and in 'Mercure' (September 1773). Les Sabots is also known in a Chinese reverse glass painting.
Boucher was one of the most important French painters of the 18th century and there are a number of his works found on Chinese export reverse glass painting with many following engravings by René Gaillard. Such European subject reverse glass paintings became increasingly popular in the later part of the 18th century and large numbers of prints were sent out to Canton to be reproduced in this way.
Other works reproduced on Chinese Reverse Glass include:
Gaillard after Boucher:
Le Bergere Recompensé
Les Amant Surpris
L’Agréable Leçon
Sylvie Delivrée par Aminte
Obeissance Recompensé
Jupiter & Callisto
Venus & Adonis
Gaillard after Charles-Dominique Eisen:
Le Mouton Favori
Le Beau Bouquet Bien Reçu
Other works by Boucher on CRG engraved by various:
Toilet of Venus (engr. JF Janinet)
Jupiter & Leda (engr. William Wynne Ryland)
Le Pasteur Galante (engr. André Laurent)
Le Pasteur Complaisant (engr André Laurent)
Sylvia cure Phyllis of Bee Sting & Aminta
Returns to Life in Sylvia’s Arms (both engr. LS Lempereur)
La Fécondité, engraving circa 1773 by René Gaillard (1719-1790) after François Boucher (1703-1770) (Author’s Collection)
Les Sabots (1768) by François Boucher left, Chinese reverse glass, centre, print by René Gaillard, 1773 and right, oil on canvas, Art Gallery of Ontario
Pocket Sundial
19th Century
European or Chinese Market
Dimensions: length 5 inches; 12.6cm
A rare Chinese pocket sundial in white metal, champlevé enamel, paste and brass, with original silk lined box.
A small number of these rare and unusual devices are recorded and this is a particularly fine example in good condition.
In the early 19th century in Canton there was a small market for clever items such as clocks, watches, automata and scientific instruments, which were popular with the Chinese Imperial court as well as with Europeans. This item must have been made in the same Imperial workshops.
References: A similar champlevé enamel sundial, made by the Workshops of the Qing Court, is illustrated in Scientific and Technical Instruments of the Qing Dynasty, The Complete Collection of the Treasures of the Palace Museum, Beijing, 1995, cat no. 20, page 27; a similar example is in the Ernst Collection, Harvard College Observatory; another damaged example is in the Science Museum, South Kensington, London (No 195-237) incorrectly described as Korean.
Dinner Plate
Dauguang period 1841-1850
English Market
Diameter: 9¾ inches; 24.8cm
Provenance: a private Swedish collector and member of the Swedish Oriental Ceramics Society, who started to collect in the early 1980's.
A fine and rare Chinese porcelain dinner plate decorated in famille rose enamels with a central portrait representing the Daoguang Emperor seated on a chair, the rim with four foliate swags.
This unusual plate appears to take its design from an engraving by Charles Hullmandel (1789-1850) for Samuel Kidd’s book China, or Illustrations of the Philosophy, Government, and Literature of the Chinese, London, 1841.
Samuel Kidd (1799-1843) was an English missionary who served in Malacca in the 1820s and was later appointed professor of Chinese at University College, London, from 183742.
Kidd’s book on China was published during the First Opium War of 1838-42. At the time the British were not familiar with the appearance of the Daoguang Emperor so Kidd included this image in his book, which became popular as a result. Although it has since been shown to be a more generic image, produced as Chinese pith paintings for visitors in Canton that did not really resemble the Emperor, it was produced here on porcelain to appeal to the same market.
frontispiece
Samuel Kidd’s China (1841) engraved by Charles Hullmandel
Chinese export pith painting, 19th century, (image courtesy Oriental Antiques UK)
Charger
Daoguang period circa 1830
European Market
Diameter: 14½ inches; 36.5cm
A Chinese export porcelain blue and white charger painted with a range of unusual animals around a central dragon-phoenix chimera all on a ground of waves, the rim a lappet border, the reverse with four Daoist precious objects and an apocryphal Kangxi mark within a double circle.
This extraordinary dish is previously unrecorded and might have been a special commssion. The animals are a curious selection and in several cases probably the only examples of their type to be found on Chinese porcelain. They are very likely taken from one of the many Natural History illustrated books that were produced from the mid-eighteenth century onwards and which multiplied substantially in the early nineteenth century as the study of biological systematics developed.
At this time there was also a revival of interest in Kangxi porcelains and many items were made in the earlier style or with Kangxi marks. The style of this dish is somewhat mixed as it also borrows from a Ming period decoration with the animals reserved on a stylised ‘wave’ ground. This is a homage to the past rather than any attempt at deception but the result here is a very curious mixture of artistic origins.
In Canton in the eighteenth century many of the European traders were also naturalists but their focus was more economic - collecting specimens and taking them back to Europe. By 1780 Sir Joseph Banks FRS (1743-1820) was installing people in Canton to study Chinese Natural History, including Alexander Duncan, Surgeon to the English Factory and later George Thomas Staunton, who was Banks’ main agent in Canton from 1799-1820. In the early nineteenth century there was a growing focus on taxonomy and a purer scientific study, though still within the framework of trade.
By the 1820s there were many Natural History scholars in Canton, producing drawings and collecting specimens of Chinese flora and fauna for European Museums and some of them made use of the artistic expertise developed in the workshops producing pith paintings for export to the West. Notable among these was John Reeves FRS FLS (1 May 1774 – 22 March 1856) an employee of the English East India Company and a
professional Naturalist and Tea Inspector. He was later joined by his son John Russell Reeves (1804-1877) who inherited his father’s collection of thousands of drawings of plants, animals and geological specimens and then left them to the British Museum (Natural History) in London.
This charger was created within this milieu of flowering scientific expertise in Canton. The sources for the drawings are uncertain and likely from several different sources. It is probable that drawings using these printed sources were made in Canton to be sent to Jingdezhen with the order - all blue and white decoration had to be done there as only the overglaze enamel decoration was possible in Canton itself.
Early Natural History publications included those by George Edward FRS (1694-1773) and GeorgesLouis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707-1788) and from 1792-1830 the extensive Bilderbuch für Kinder by Friedrich (Johann) Justin Bertuch (1747–1822). There were 237 parts combined into 12 volumes with a total of 1187 copper-engravings. These were engraved with illustrations copied from multiple sources by the students of the Kupferstecherschule (School for Engraving) in Weimar under the supervision of Johann Heinrich Lips (1758–1817) and Georg Melchior Kraus (1737–1806).
Some suggested possible sources are given on the next page but it is difficult to be certain about them as these drawings were constantly being copied and many
of the poses are simple. In any case the Chinese artist has clearly shown an artistic freedom in the lively painting of these animals and not followed the models too closely.
The choice of animals is peculiar and it is not possible to be sure whether this is deliberate or more random. There are two birds, three quadrupeds, three fish and an insect. In the centre is a Chinese mythical animal, a flying winged dragon (yinglong - a rain dragon, fitting for the watery background) but with a feathered tail like a phoenix (fenghuang) - an unusual combination. In some myths the yinglong is the progenitor of many animals including birds, quadrupeds and scaly animals. So possibly this scheme is therefore some allusion to a creation myth?
The inclusion of the Great Auk ( Pinguinus impennis, L. 1758) is surprising though this species, which had been widely known across the Northern Hemisphere was, by the time of the creation of this porcelain, becoming much scarcer and was extinct by 1846. This wonderful bird, almost two foot tall and flightless was the original penguin (‘pinion-wing’) though it is not related to the penguins of the southern hemisphere that were named after it. The print source is not certain.
The Pelican is likely taken from an edition of the Bertuch Bilderbuch (plate VI) but could also be from The Naturalist's Pocket Magazine. However on the porcelain the bird has a noticeable crest on the back of its head which is only found on the Spot-Billed Pelican (Pelecanus philippensis, Gmelin, 1789) a species that was then found in parts of China and might therefore have been more familiar to the Chinese artist who could have altered the drawing accordingly. It is now endangered and extinct in China.
The Rhinoceros depicted here is the Black Rhinoceros, Diceros bicornis (L. 1758) and is likely taken from
Rhinoceroses on Chinese Export Porcelain
One other example is recorded on the ‘motto’ or ‘emblem’ service made circa 1770 and much of which was originally at North Mymms Park, sold by Christies 26 Sept 1979. This interesting Chinese export service is made in a Meissen style with a central rococo cartouche that has a different emblem and motto on each piece.
The designs are all taken from the book Symbola et Emblemata (1705) commissioned by Peter the Great from Henry Wetstein (1649-1726) (and Joseph Mulder (b1660), who probably did the engravings) in Amsterdam. The book was popular and a Second edition was printed in 1741 in Amsterdam by A van Huissteen & S van Esveldt and a Third edition in 1743 in Haarlem by Johannes Marshoorn. A St Petersburg edition was edited in 1788 by Nestor Maksimovitsch Ambodik.
the illustration in Bertuch. It is not the only example of a Rhino found on Chinese export porcelain (see note below).
The Hippopotamus is painted with its mouth wide open - an unusual pose in the naturalist drawings though Bertuch’s illustration at least has the mouth open somewhat.
The Ass or Donkey ( Equus africanus asinus, L., 1758) is finely painted in a blue wash and is illustrated in most books in a similar pose.
The ‘Spur-fish’ is copied from an engraving by George Edwards from his Gleanings on Natural History (175864). It was repoduced in The Naturalist's Pocket Magazine, Harrison (1798-1802). There is no scientific consensus which actual fish this is meant to be. It could be a Humphead Parrotfish (Bolbometopon muricatum, Valenciennes, 1840) or a Humphead Wrasse (Cheilinus undulatus, Rüppell, 1835) also known as a Napoleon Wrasse. They are both large fish but neither of these was formally described until 1840 and 1835 respectively though Edwards’ drawing is much earlier, etched in 1755. Alternatively it might be the Butterfly Blenny (Blennius ocelaris, L. 1758) which is smaller and was described by Linnaeus in 1758.
The second fish is probably a Sail Fish (Scomber gladius, G. Shaw, 1792), illustrated by Bertuch and the third is the Painted Frog Fish (Antennarius pictus, Shaw, 1794) a relatively common and voracius carnivore, up to twelve inches long, found on the sea bed in the coral reefs of the Indo-Pacific, it is also illustrated by Bertuch and both of these follow his images.
The male Elephant Beetle (Megasoma elephas, Fabricius, 1775) is probably also taken from the Bertuch illustration though most illustrations look very similar.
detail, central cartouche on a Chinese export soup plate, circa 1770, Lot 751 in the 1979 sale.
emblem No 511
Non Recedo Nisi Vincam [I shall not go before I shall have vanquished] (see left for source details)
The following pages present notes and new findings on various print sources for European Subject Chinese export porcelain. They represent a work in progress.
Mortality
(Cherub blowing bubbles)
Porcelain: Two versions recorded on CEP.
a: first design, on a saucer in the Rijksmuseum (AK-NM11513-B)
b: second design, Cohen &Cohen 2001, No22 teabowl & saucer, illustrated here. Other examples: Rijksmuseum (AKNM-13561); HB p321; Jörg 1997, p292, No 341; Howard 1994, p182, No 209.
It looks like the second reworking is an attempt to fill the round space better, though it is less well drawn than the original. (a) is rare and could have been a sample produced for a supercargo in Canton.
Design Source: engraved by Jacob van de Schley after an engraving by Pierre-François Basan (1723-1797) after a drawing by Jacob de Wit (1695-1754).
A small vignette is in the Rijksmuseum by Jacob van der Schley (RP-P-2021-4981) that uses this image, probably copied after the Basan/de Wit. This small example is much closer to the first version of the porcelain and so more likely to have been the one taken to China. Probably a cul-delampe/title vignette for a book but the source is unknown.
The Basan print is signed at the top of the pyramid. This example is in the Riksmuseum (RP-P-OB-61.056); there is another one lacking any mention of Basan (RP-P-19056646).
The original drawing by de Wit has not been located but several very similar drawings and small paintings of Allegories are recorded with putti and various symbols.
References: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 50 (2002), p. 258-263, Marten van Calcar identifies the print source to the Basan engraving.
François Basan after Jacob de Wit Rijksmuseum (RP-P-OB-61.056)
Rijksmuseum (AK-NM-11513-B)
Jacob van der Schley (41mm x 63mm) Rijksmuseum RP-P-2021-4981
Rijksmuseum (AK-NM-11513-B)
European Subjects on Chinese export porcelain:
Groups of related images
Within this specialised area of collecting and study one of the central questions remains: Why, out of the hundreds of thousands of printed images made were only these few taken to China and copied onto porcelain?
The answer is complex and granular covering as it does the whole of the long 18th Century from the 1690s to the early 19th century. There is no clear answer but some patterns have emerged.
This catalogue has several examples spanning this period and unsurprisingly the range is quite varied. It can at times seem randomthough the expense and the time taken for the order to be received always suggests that the choices were deliberate and particular.
However recent studies of this subject by this author and others has revealed a number of groups of related images, many from the same book or suite of prints. Some of these groups are presented here for the first time.
1. Lottery book (three designs on CEP)
2. Hoogstratens’s Gods & Goddesses (five on CEP and one other related from Pomey’s Pantheum Mysticum)
3. Seneca’s Morals: an English translation by Roger L’Estrange with prints attributed to several engravers (four on CEP).
4. Aesop’s Fables: an English editon by Samuel Croxall with prints attributed to Elisha Kirkall. (nine on CEP)
5. An unusual Emblem book created in Augsburg by Hieronymous Sperling , Jeremias Wolff and Georg Probst. (seven export tea and coffee services derived from five prints).
Other groups which have been published elsewhere include:
5. A suite of six prints by Charles Dominiqe Eisen illustrating an opera by Favart, Les Moissoneurs. (four, possibly five, on CEP) Published by Cohen & Cohen.
6. The Larmessin Suite illustrating LaFontaine’s Contes et Nouvelles. (six on CEP).
7. Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Many examples: For an acount of these see Motley, W (2022) Ovid on China: Images from Illustrated Suites of Scenes from Ovid on Eighteenth-Century Chinese Export Porcelain, Chapter 3, p6687, in Ovid in China, Reception, Translation, and Comparison, edited by Thomas J. Sienkewicz, Jinyu Liu, (Leiden ; Boston : Brill, [2022] | Series: Metaforms: studies in the reception of classical antiquity, 22129405 ; volume 22).
1. Lottery Book
Three prints from 'tVermakelijk lottooneel van Holland, Leiden, Hendrik van Damme, 1705 & 1707. Published in two volumes with eight prints by Jan Goeree (1670-1731). (A, B in Vol 1 and C in Vol 2)
A. Formerly called Le Buveur as it was thought the man was holding an empty flagon, in fact it is an empty money bag.
Porcelain: HB 15.40, teapot stand, polychrome with grisaille drawing, c 1745; CrosbyForbes 1982, Yang-ts’ai: The Foreign Colours, (exhibition catalogue, China Trade Museum, Milton, Massachusetts) p42, No 70, plate (no 1975.27.164); Le Corbeiller, p91, a plate; Hyde, pl XVI, fig. 57, saucer.
B & C:
Porcelain: only one teabowl and saucer recorded, the upper scene on the saucer and teabowl and the lower scene on the underside of the saucer, Philadelphia Museum of Art (No 1882-1254).
2. Pantheum Mythicum - Goden en Godinnen
At least six designs on porcelain are recorded that derive from the Pantheons of Pagan Gods produced in the 17th & 18th centuries as illustrated texts intended for education of the young.
Porcelain:
The porcelains fall into two fairly clear groups:
a. five designs (A-E): dinner plates plates painted en grisaille and in fairly good quality, with a central scene and with borders of panels and scrolling that suggest a date around 1745-50. Examples of some are known with different borders, though all have a gilt spear border in the cavetto. Some are also found on armorial services.
b. F, two teaservices, one in famille rose and one in grisaille with rouge-de-fer flesh tones. These are rare and of a weaker quality of painting, though the two are very similar and likely from the same workshop and made at the same time.
Design Source: These are taken from two related works describing the pagan Gods.
1. Five of the images (A-E) are taken from David van Hoogstraten (1716) Beschryving de Heidensche Goden en Godinnen, getogen uit de fabelschryveren en oude dichteren. [Description of the Pagan Gods and Goddesses, raised from the fables and old poets] First Edition: Amsterdam 1716, Nicolaas ten Hoorn. [The second edition dates from 1726 and editions followed in 1733, 1742 & 1761]. The 1742 edition would seem to be around the right date to have been taken to China and used for these designs.
2. One image (F) is derived from a work by the Jesuit priest François Pomey (1619-1673), Pantheum mythicum seu fabulosa deorum historia (1659), with illustrations added circa 1690 by Jan van Vianen (c1660-1726) an Amsterdam engraver who also worked in London.
Van Hoogstraten’s mythology was based on Pomey’s Pantheum Mythicum, which itself was derived from Boccaccio and others. He translated Pomey’s stories into Dutch but decided also to add material of his own and from other sources including Beschryving der Roomsche Mogentheit by Joachim Oudaen (1628-1692), and works of the French author Pierre Gautruche (1602-1681).
Similarly some of the 32 plates of the van Hoogstraten are derived from the van Vianen illustrations. Others are new creations with some elements taken from other sources including a detail (Scylla) from the Leclerc/Chauveau illustrations for the Ovid Metamorphoses, tr. Isaac Benserade (1676).
The images in the van Hoogstraten mythology are not signed, though the frontispiece is by Jan Goeree. Other works by van Hoogstraten had illustrations by Romeyn de Hooghe, Jacob Houbraken and notably his Dutch translation of the Fables of Phaedrus (1703) had many small illustrations by Jan van Vianen. So it is quite possible that van Vianen engraved these also, using elements from his first suite for Pomey’s Pantheum. Examples are known in only one orientation suggesting that the plates were not
re-engraved, though a comparison of the 1716 and 1742 editions shows that the plates were touched up a little.
The 1742 edition was published in Amsterdam by ‘Adriaan Wor, en de Erve G. onder de Linden’. Adriaan Wor published between 1729 and 1746 with the ‘heirs’ (Erve) of Gerard onder de Linden (died circa 1729) notably in 1740 an extensive poem by Jan de Marre extolling the VOC, which had an allegorical frontispiece, Batavia, by Jan Punt that is also found in puce enamels on a series of Chinese plates.
The 1742 edition of the van Hoogstraten also has a foreword by Wor dedicating the volume to Gerard van Papenbroek (1673-1743), an Amsterdam merchant and Burgomaster, and a noted art and antiquities connoisseur, who formed one of the largest 18th-century Dutch art collections that was divided between the Athenaeum Illustre of Amsterdam (his portraits) and Leiden University, the founding collection of what became the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden.
A 1733 edition of van Hoogstraten’s Dictionary was also published by Wor and dedicated to Papenbroek suggesting a relationship between the two. So perhaps Papenbroek was part of the order for the Chinese plates with these designs through the VOC.
The five images from this series known on Chinese export porcelain plates are all painted en grisaille and all around the same period, circa 1745-50. Each follows the oriention of the van Hoogstraten images and matches the details closely.
In 1698 Pomey’s Pantheum was translated into English by the Rev Andrew Tooke, later Headmaster of Charterhouse School, who did not credit Pomey, becoming known as Tooke’s Pantheon of the Heathen Gods and Illustrious Heroes. There were many editions throughout the eighteenth century, which reused and reengraved the original illustrations. These prints are found in both orientations and in some simplified versions.
Several of the van Hoogstraten designs seem to have been inspired by the van Vianen illustrations for the Pomey, and three of these (Auroria, Juno and Eolus) are also those found on Chinese porcelain but details show that they were taken from the van Hoogstraten rather than the van Vianen/Pomey/Tooke images. However one further design, not used by van Hoogstraten, is found on Chinese porcelain teawares, both in famille rose and en grisaille, Mars on a Chariot. The orientation is not the same as the original van Vianen prints and this suggests that the example taken to China was from a re-engraved version for the English Tooke translation. This indicates that both works were taken to China at some stage but the first group was mainly for the Dutch market, though the armorial services are for the English market, and the second more likely for the English market.
References: Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, p294, No 13.10, a plate (A), identified as Apollo; Howard 1974, p334, service (A) and the arms of Humbertson; Lange 2005, p201, fig. 74.
BAurora Hoogstraten 1716 First edition
FDCPomey’s Pantheum, illus. Jan van Vianen
Pomey’s Pantheum, illus. Jan van Vianen
Related source: engr. c 1676 by François Chauveau, for Ovid’s Metamorphoses, tr. Isaac Benserade
Pomey’s Pantheum, illus. Jan van Vianen
signed J van Vianen circa 1690 from Pomey’s Pantheon (Rijksmuseum RP-P-1905-918)
unsigned illustration from Tooke’s Pantheon (circa 1745)
Juno on a Chariot
Neptune - Scylla
Aeolus
Aristeus - Diana as a Statue
Mars on a Chariot
Porcelain: Originally five designs painted en grisaille on Chinese export porcelain from the mid-18th century had been linked together as possibly from a common source, all apparently allegorical representations using mythological figures.
It turns out that four of these (A-D) are indeed from a common designs source but the fifth (E), showing Hercules clubbing a lion is adapted from an entirely different source.
Design Source:
The Moral Epistles to Lucilius by Seneca the Younger (4BC - 65AD) is a series of 124 letters on various subjects apparently written to Lucilius, procurator of Sicily. In 1678 a new abstracted version in English translation by Sir Roger L’Estrange (1616-1704) was published and printed in many subsequent editions after that. In 1722 one edition was published by W Meadows that included six new illustrations, after drawings by Louis Chéron engraved by Nicolas Pigné and Elisha Kirkall.
The 1729 edition published in London (for G Strahan, A Bettesworth, J Tonson, B Lintot, B Motte and D Browne) has the same images re-engraved and signed by Paul Fourdrinier (1698-1758).
It is probably these that were taken to China. It was later produced in many copied editions, some with the plates reversed. However all four of the images from this that are known on Chinese porcelain follow the orientation of the Fourdrinier plates from 1729.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca (circa 4 BC - 65 AD) was a Roman stoic philosopher, statesman and dramatist whose works continued to be very influential in western thought throughout the middle ages and renaissance.
Sir Roger L’Estrange (1616-1704) fought as a royalist in the Civil War and later served under Charles II as press surveyor or censor. He was suspected of popish sympathies but survived the Oates plot and later was imprisoned for Jacobite support after the Revolution of 1688. L’Estrange’s version of Seneca’s Morals was widely distributed in the American colonies and helped shape the colonists sense of Roman virtue. George Washington read this work at the age of seventeen and modeled his personal conduct in accordance with its teachings.
Louis Chéron (1660-1725) was a French Huguenot painter who trained in Paris but moved to London in 1685 and worked on paintings at Montague House, Burghley House and Chatsworth. He was a founding member of the St Martin’s Lane Academy and is buried in St Paul’s, Covent Garden. Nicolas Pigné was
born in 1722 and worked in Paris but later moved to London where he died but little is known about him. Elisha Kirkall (1682-1742) was a successful and versatile engraver and publisher working mainly in London.
Paul Fourdrinier (1698-1758), also known as Peter or Pierre, was a Huguenot engraver who studied under Bernard Picart in Amsterdam and moved to England in 1720 where he worked on portraits and book illustrations including substantial works on architecture, notably William Chamber’s Designs of Chinese Buildings, 1757.
References: Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, p292, No 13.2; see also No 13.8; No13.34; No13.29; No 13.30; No 13.7; Simpson, Peter (2017). The Forgotten Fourdrinier. The Life, Times and Work of Paul Fourdrinier, Master Printmaker in London 1720-1758. USA: Author House.
A.
Porcelain: Chinese export plate, circa 1750, with central image en grisaille of a figure with a ’cello and a child drinking from a bowl (for another example see Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, No 13.8).; teawares also recorded.
Design Source: engraved circa 1722 by Elisha Kirkall after Louis Chéron, illustrating ‘Of A Happy Life’, the second part of the L’Estrange abstracts of Seneca’s Moral Epistles, later re-engraved by Paul Fourdrinier, 1729. The upper figure has been omitted from the design.
B.
Porcelain: Chinese export porcelain plate, circa 1750, with an image of a seated woman with a lance and holding an arrow, with a recumbent lion (an example also in Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, No13.34).
Design Source: engraved circa 1772 by Nicolas Pigné, probably after Louis Chéron, illustrating ‘Clemency’, the fourth part of the L’Estrange abstracts of Seneca’s Moral Epistles, later re-engraved by Paul Fourdrinier, 1729.
C.
Porcelain: Chinese export porcelain plate, circa 1750, with a man holding a sword running alongside a lion (for another example see Hervouët & Bruneau 1986, No 13.30). This is known with several different borders.
Design Source: engraved circa 1722 by Elisha Kirkall after Louis Chéron, illustrating ‘Of Anger’, the third part of the L’Estrange abstracts of Seneca’s Moral Epistles, later re-engraved by Paul Fourdrinier, 1729.
D.
Porcelain: Chinese export porcelain plate, circa 1750, with Hebe and an eagle; teawares en grisaille also recorded.
Design Source: The image is taken from an engraved plate by Nicolas Pigné after a drawing by Louis Chéron (1660-1725)., titled Contemplation (for Epistle XXVIII), later re-engraved by Paul Fourdrinier, 1729.
E. Taken from a different source
Porcelain: Chinese export porcelain plate with a man clubbing a lion, circa 1750, surrounded by flags (Hervouët & Bruneau 1986 No 13.29); another example is in the British Museum. This is not one of the designs for Seneca’s Morals but is often associated with it.
Design Source: taken from a 1751 group of ornament prints, originally made circa 1680 by Jean Le Pautre (1618-1689) and published “À Paris chez P. Mariette” for Pierre Mariette (1634-1716). A large collection of Le Pautre’s work was republished in 1751 by Charles Antoine Jombert (17121784) and this example illustrated here is from that edition.
4. Aesop’s Fables on Chinese Export Porcelain after Sébastien Leclerc (1682) and after Elisha Kirkall (1722)
Around 1682/3 Sébastien Leclerc 1637-1714) published a small suite of 23 prints in oval format illustrating stories from Aesop’s Fables (22 fables plus the title page).
In 1722 The Fables of Aesop and Others was produced in London with a new English text by Samuel Croxall (1688/9-1752) published by Jacob Tonson at the Shakespear's Head, in the Strand, with 196 illustrations attributed to Elisha Kirkall (1662-1742) derived from a number of sources including reversed copies of the Leclerc series (21 of the 22 fable illustrations) and more derived from Aesop suites by Francis Barlow and others. The book was popular and remained in print until later in the 19th century. The simple line drawn illustrations by Kirkall are in oval format, following the size and style of the Leclerc series but adding many more. The examples illustrated here are from the 7th edition, 1760, which used the original plates. Later editions may have some of the plates reworked.
These images were widely used by craftsmen and decorators for ceramics and other media including by Sadler and Green on Liverpool delft tiles. It is not suprising that some of them should have found their way onto a ship heading to Canton and being used as models for designs on Chinese export porcelain.
Of the nine identified export porcelain designs here, only one, The Wolf and the Dog, looks to have been derived directly from the Leclerc print version, judging from the orientation of the image. This is also in famille rose and seems of a later date than the others, all of which are painted en grisaille and in a similar style. One other, The Man and his Two Wives, is a Leclerc design copied by Kirkall but this seems to have been copied in China from the Kirkall not the Leclerc. The other seven are not in the Leclerc series. One design on porcelain is created from two Kirkall images on facing pages in the book, which are both derived from prints by Francis Barlow. One design, Caesar and the Slave, is only similar to Kirkall’s design and possibly a related image was sent to China.
Croxall was educated at Eton and entered the Church though he continued to write and translate. He was a contributor to the English translation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, with John Dryden, John Gay and Joseph Addison among others, overseen by Samuel Garth. His Aesop’s Fables was his most successful work, written in a simple style and aimed at children as well as adults.
Kirkall was born in Sheffield and moved to London working in the book trade, using line engraving for illustrations. His work on Croxall’s Aesop is an attribution based on guesswork but he has been credited with the work by print historians from early in the 19th century onwards.
Fab XC
Traditionally attributed to a print by Francis Barlow but much closer to one by Sébastien Leclerc I (1637-1714). Several orders of porcelain - teawares and plates with different borders.
Fab XVII
After the Kirkall not the Leclerc - look at the vertical lines beside the window, and the orientation of the image.
A man had two wives, one older and one younger. Both of them being vain, the younger one, who did not wish to be thought of as his daughter, pulled white hairs from the man’s head and the older, not wishing to be thought his mother, pulled the dark hairs. He went bald.
One rare teaservice en grisaille.
After Kirkall. The figure on the right is supposed to be Aesop himself.
A man bitten by a dog was advised by an old woman to dip a piece of bread in the wound and then feed it to the dog. Aesop passing by asked him what he was doing and when the man explained he warned him to do it only in private otherwise it would encourage all the dogs of the town to bite everyone.
From Croxall’s Application: “Nothing contributes so much to the increase of roguery, as when the undertakings of a rogue are attended with success.”
One rare teaservice en grisaille.
Fab CXLVI
After Kirkall. Long thought to be a religious subject.
An old man, tired of his quarrelling sons, summoned them. He first gave them a bundle of sticks, tightly bound together and commanded his sons break them. When they could not he untied the bundle and gave one stick to each son, again commanding them to break the sticks. They complied easily. He said: “O my sons, behold the power of unity!”
One rare teaservice en grisaille, circa 1755.
Fab CLVII
After Kirkall. Long thought to be a religious subject, possibly the Arrest of Christ.
A trumpeter arrested after a battle begged to be spared as he said he did not bear arms and could not kill, only sounding on command. The soldiers replied that they would not spare him because “with that wicked instrument of yours you blow up animosity between other people, and so are the occasion of much bloodshed.”
One rare teaservice en grisaille, circa 1755.
Fab CLXIII and CLXIV
After Kirkall - adapted from Francis Barlow. Taken from facing pages in the book.
Fab CVI
After Kirkall.
1. An ass loaded with fine foods stops to eat a thistle. He reflects on the comparison between his load and the thistle. “But to me, this bitter prickly thistle is more savory and relishing than the most exquisite and sumptuous banquet.”
2. A horse and ass are both heavily loaded. The ass asks the stronger horse if he might take some of his burden but the horse grumpily refuses. The Ass promptly dies and the Countryman puts the whole load, and the Ass’s hide, onto the Horse to carry.
One rare teaservice en grisaille, circa 1755.
A shepherd leaves his dog in charge of the sheep. While he is away the dog, usually well behaved, eats some of the sheep. When the shepherd returns he berates the dog and decides to hang him. The dog begs for mercy and asks why he is being treated worse than the wolf. The man replies that his crime is the worst because it is so treacherous - whereas the wolf is an open enemy.
One rare teaservice en grisaille, circa 1755.
Fab CV
After Kirkall but with notable differences especially in the background. A slave eagerly waters the ground before Caesar to suppress the dust and hoping to earn his freedom. Caesar is annoyed at the over-attentiveness and denies it.
One rare teaservice famille rose circa 1770. Later than most of the others and probably a different workshop.
Fab CVI
After Kirkall. (originally thought to show the killing of a peacock, which the Chinese artist may have misinterpreted).
An old lady makes her maidservants start work when the rooster crows in the morning. In order to get more sleep the maids kill the rooster but they are seen by their mistress and henceforth she demands they start work at midnight.
One rare teaservice en grisaille, circa 1755.
5. Sperling/Probst Emblem Series
At least seven Chinese export porcelain teaservices with famille rose decoration and ‘European Subject’ designs are derived from five prints from a set of emblem prints by Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777).
The porcelains appear to be from the same workshop and made at the same date (circa 1755-60), judging by the colouring and the rococo border decoration - some of which is also taken directly from the Sperling prints and the coffee pots and milk jugs are all of similar styles.
The Sperling Emblem series is titled: Troiano regio Principi Paridi delatum praerogativae iudicium inter Iunonem, Venerem et Minervam sive divitias, amorem & sapientiam ad utilem oblectationem : LII emblematibus moralibus, quae delineata et aeri affabre incisa. (To Prince Paris, Prince of Troy, is granted the right of judgment between Juno, Venus and Minerva, whether riches, love or wisdom should be used for good entertainment). The text is by Philipp Jakob Croph I (1666-1742) a Protestant teacher, librarian and rector of St Anna, Augsburg.
It seems to have been published in at least two editions, first, some time before 1724, by Jeremias Wolff (1663-1724) with plates by Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) which has a title image and 20 numbered emblems, the title page mentions 52 emblems and these 20 are the ‘first part’.
A second edition by the same publishing house appeared after Wolff's death, around 1750, and by ‘Jeremias Wolff Heirs’, i.e. Johann Balthasar Probst (1673-1750) who married a daughter of Wolff, with their son Johann Friederich Probst (172181) and Wolff’s sons. The old printing plates of Hieronymus Sperling were probably reused and supplemented by a circular background with horizontal hatching. Some are signed Johann Friderich Probst excudit. This edition is renumbered. The title page is now inscribed Plate 1 and those up to 20 are now 2-21. After that the second edition has 9 additional plates 22-30 inclusive.
Note:
Two of the designs, Venus in a Boat, P22, (FOV155) and Mansion with Drawbridge, P25, (FOV157) are only in the Probst edition, numbered 22 & 25 respectively, which indicates that the Probst edition was likely the one that went to China, also being closer in date to the manufacture of the porcelains.
The Chinese porcelain designs are curious and sophisticated. Three of them use the central image in a straightforward manner, (Kronos (FOV152), Venus in a Boat (FOV155), Burning Heart with Hands (FOV156) and Mansion with Drawbridge (FOV157), though this last one omits the animal at the front. The other four use selected details from the composition to make a simpler design for the porcelain. Whilst these are cleaner and visually satisfying (and cheaper to make) they miss the point of the emblem. For example the one with two men and the heart in a cage (FOV151) has omitted all the flying hats of rank and success. Three of them, Putti with Goat and Leopard (FOV153), The Burning Heart (FOV154) and Burning Heart with Hands (FOV156) are details taken from the same print, in the first case the two putti riding animals are isolated and switched around to face each other thus making a more satisfying image on their own.
[Many thanks to Kee Il Choi for his help with this series].
A complete copy of the second edition is in the New York Metropolitan Museum: Title: Trojano regio Principi Paridi, delatu Praerogativae Iudiciu inter Iunonem, Venerem e Minervam ... Publisher: Johann Friedrich Probst (German, Augsburg 1721–1781 Augsburg) [should be Johann Balthasar Probst?] Date: after 1724 Medium: Engraving, etching
Credit Line: Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1951; (Accession Number: 51.540.6)
Two Men and Cage
FOV 151
FOV 155
FOV 154
FOV 153
FOV 156
Putti Riding Goat and Leopard Burning Heart Burning Heart with Hands
Venus on Boat with Swans
FOV 157
FOV 152
Kronos,Woman, Windmill
Mansion with Drawbridge
Sperling/Probst
Emblem 1,
Two Men and Cage
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) drawn and engraved; printed and published by Johann Balthasar Probst (1673 Augsburg - 1750 ibid.), Emblem No 15 (XV), "Wish what you will, if money is available", wish of the wealthy, Petron, c. 1750, Copper engraving. (This example from the Probst in the Author’s collection). Wolff edition No 14.
Porcelain: Coffee pot, circa 1755, in the V&A (C.42&A-1951) Basil Ionides bequest; H&B 9.34, a saucer.
Sperling/Probst Emblem 2
Kronos, Woman and Windmill
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) drawn and engraved; by Johann Balthasar Probst (1673 Augsburg - 1750 ibid.), Emblem No 18 (XVIII).
Porcelain: circa 1755, lobed oval dish, (private collection); this coffee cup, source unknown.
Sperling/Probst Emblem 4
Venus on Boat with Swans
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) drawn and engraved; printed and published by Johann Balthasar Probst (1673-1750), Emblem No 22 (XXII), "Speramus Amari” (We hope to be loved), (Ovid de Remed L. 2.), c. 1750, Copper engraving, signed Johan Friedrich Probst (1721-81). This is one of the extra images included in the Probst edition that is not found in the Wolff edition, which suggests clearly that it must have been a copy of the Probst edition that went to China and was used by one workshop as source for at least seven export teaware designs.
Porcelain: one rare famille rose export teaservice, circa 1755; this example in the Mark Dransfield collection; HB 13.14 a coffee cup; jug in the BM, No 1963, 04224.4 Ionides collection.
FOV 152
Wolff edition No 17
Probst edition No 18
Wolff edition No 14
Probst edition No 15
FOV 155
FOV 156
FOV 153
Sperling/Probst Emblem 3c
Burning heart and hands
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) drawn and engraved; printed and published by Johann Balthasar Probst (1673-1750), Emblem No 16 (XVI), Quotation, ‘Moderatius Opta’ (more moderate wishes) from Ovid’s Letters from the Black Sea (Epistolae de Ponto) book I. (Wolff edn No 15, Probst edn No 16)
Porcelain: one rare teaservice in famille rose. HB 7.120 - a coffee pot with this design - only example found so far.
Very unusual to have three different designs on porcelain taken after details from a single print like this. See also FOV153 and FOV154
Sperling/Probst Emblem 3a
Two putti riding goat and leopard
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) - as for FOV156 above
Porcelain: one teaservice known, circa 1755, this saucer from the Mark Dransfield collection; a coffee pot was with Santos; HB 13.82 a teapoy.
The design takes the two peripheral putti riding animals but switches them so that they face each other on the porcelain.
Sperling/Probst Emblem 3b Burning Heart
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) as for FOV 156 above
Porcelain: one rare teaservice in famille rose, this teabowl from an auction at Uppsala; HB 13.32 - a coffee pot with this design.
The gilt border around the image seems also derived from this print.
Very unusual to have three different designs on porcelain taken after details from a single print like this.
Probst edition No 16
Probst edition No 16
Wolff edition No 15
Probst edition No 16
Sperling/Probst Emblem 5
Mansion with drawbridge
Print: Hieronymus Sperling (1695-1777) drawn and engraved; printed and published by Johann Balthasar Probst (1673 Augsburg - 1750 ibid.), Emblem No 25 (XXV), "Forma Timere Facit”, (Ovid, Heroides, Ep. xvii, 171-174.), c. 1750, Copper engraving.
This is one of the extra images included in the Probst edition that have not been found in the Wolff edition. This suggests clearly that it was a copy of the Probst edition that went to China and was used by one workshop as a source for at least five export teaware designs.
The mansion appears to be inspired by a small print, originally circa 1683, by Sébastien Leclerc (1637-1714) from his Petit Paysages (Les Courtanvaux - 37 of these dedicated to the Marquis de Courtanvaux) (see example from Oeuvres Choisies 1774, left).
Porcelain: Qianlong period circa 1755-60; one teaservice in famille rose with the central building from the design but lacking the rabbit. Well dispersed, with examples turning up regularly. This pot in the Tibor Coollection sold CNY, April 2019; tbs in Reeves Colln (1996.6.2); for a large tea set, see The Chinese Porcelain Company, Important Chinese Porcelain, 1995, p. 80, no. 61.
Three Chinese export porcelain teaware designs derived from one printed image:
Objects acquired from Cohen & Cohen are now in the following museum collections:
British Museum, London
Bristol Museum
Jeffrye Museum, London
Foundling Hospital Museum, London
Groniger Museum, Groeningen
East India Company Museum Lorient
Adrien-Dubouché National Porcelain Museum, Limoges
Sèvres Ceramics Museum
Peabody Essex Museum, Salem Mass.
Kenton Foundation, California
New Orleans Museum Of Art
Virginia Museum Of Art, Richmond Va
Minneapolis Museum
Winterthur Museum
Norton Museum of Art, Palm Beach Fl
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The Tea Museum, Hong Kong
Hong Kong Maritime Museum
Nanchang University Museum
The Mint Museum, Charlotte, North Carolina
The Asian Civilisations Museum, Singapore
The Musée Guimet, Paris
The Metropolitan Museum, New York
Muzeum Żup Krakowskich Wieliczka
Halim Museum of Time and Glass, Chicago
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