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Lot Essay
This figure is marked 'K.H.C.', indicating that it belonged to the Königlische Hof-Conditorei or Royal Court Pantry, the department which was responsible for the food and table decorations for the dessert course, the finale of any formal meal or state banquet. Court pantries existed not only at Dresden, but also in Warsaw, where August III spent time as King of Poland, and for a short time at the royal hunting palace of Hubertusburg. The first porcelain figures commissioned for the royal table were for the three royal marriages of 1747, with figures destined for the Royal Court Pantry first appearing in the work records of 1746. The 1752 inventory of equipment and porcelain belonging to the court pantry lists around three thousand figures of which about a thousand were enamelled and the remainder were left white. After the Seven Years War, in 1768, the royal court pantries were consolidated in Dresden and by 1774 the stock of figures had been reduced to approximately one thousand five hundred polychrome examples and seven hundred white ones.1
The Commedia dell'Arte zanni or valet figure of Pulcinella, known as Polichinelle in France and Punch in England, was two-faced, short-tempered, crude and lazy, all beneath a good-humoured exterior. Like his companion and rival Scaramouche he hailed from Naples and was created by the Neapolitan actor, Silvio Fiorillo, with the role being further refined by another actor and tailor, Andrea Calcese. Recognisable by his hunch-back and sometimes holding a mask he is often depicted in Italy wearing a peasant clown costume and in France and England in old-fashioned livery.2
1. See the article by Maureen Cassidy-Geiger, 'Meissen Porcelain Figures in the Royal Court Pantries in Dresden Warsaw and Hubertsusberg: A Crash Course in the Hof-Conditorei inventories taken ahead of the Seven Years War', Art Antiques Exhibition catalogue, London, 2015, pp. 84-91, for further details of the inventories taken of the court pantries.
2. For further discussion of Pulcinella's character and details of the sources that influenced the porcelain modellers and painters of the 18th century see Meredith Chilton, Harlequin Unmasked, The Commedia dell'Arte and Porcelain Sculpture, Singapore, 2001, pp. 93-94.
The Commedia dell'Arte zanni or valet figure of Pulcinella, known as Polichinelle in France and Punch in England, was two-faced, short-tempered, crude and lazy, all beneath a good-humoured exterior. Like his companion and rival Scaramouche he hailed from Naples and was created by the Neapolitan actor, Silvio Fiorillo, with the role being further refined by another actor and tailor, Andrea Calcese. Recognisable by his hunch-back and sometimes holding a mask he is often depicted in Italy wearing a peasant clown costume and in France and England in old-fashioned livery.2
1. See the article by Maureen Cassidy-Geiger, 'Meissen Porcelain Figures in the Royal Court Pantries in Dresden Warsaw and Hubertsusberg: A Crash Course in the Hof-Conditorei inventories taken ahead of the Seven Years War', Art Antiques Exhibition catalogue, London, 2015, pp. 84-91, for further details of the inventories taken of the court pantries.
2. For further discussion of Pulcinella's character and details of the sources that influenced the porcelain modellers and painters of the 18th century see Meredith Chilton, Harlequin Unmasked, The Commedia dell'Arte and Porcelain Sculpture, Singapore, 2001, pp. 93-94.