CIRCA 1765

Details

A famille rose 'Amsterdam harbour' scene dish
Circa 1765
Painted with two rowing boats before de Stadts-Herberg on the waterfront of Amsterdam, anchored sailing ships and numerous revellers at the windows of the inn and passing figures on the quay, all below pale clouds, the rim decorated with small sprays of flowers
22.2 cm. diam.

Provenance

With paper label inscribed 'Stodel', 'Tentoonstelling van oude kunst- Rijksmuseum 1929'.

Special notice

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Lot Essay

A similarly decorated plate illustrated in Howard & Ayers, China for the West, London, 1978, vol.1, p. 193, no. 190, where the authors discuss the possibility that this subject of decoration must have been commissioned for the centennial of the Stadts-Herbergh (or Nieuwe Stadsherberg), the tavern built in 1662 and demolished in 1872. The building fronted the River IJ in Amsterdam and was a popular haunt for generations of Dutch V.O.C. (East India Company) sailors, who most probably made it their first and last port of call between voyages.
No exact print source for this decoration has yet been discovered. However, Le Corbeiller, in Patterns of Exchange, p. 108, no. 45, illustrates an engraving from Beschreibung der Stadt Amsterdam, published in 1664, which depicts a very similar view.

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