DATED 1555, POSSIBLY WORKSHOP OF VIRGILOTTO CALAMELLI

Details

A LARGE FAENZA MAIOLICA DATED ISTORIATO CHARGER
DATED 1555, POSSIBLY WORKSHOP OF VIRGILOTTO CALAMELLI
The center painted with Venus and Mars in a landscape, with Cupid nearby and also in a cloud above, a tablet to the right inscribed MARTE / VENERA, the a quartieri border with orange, green and blue-ground panels reserved with trophies, scrolling foliage and masks and centered at the sides, above and below with four portrait panels named for CEC ARE (Julius Caesar), NERONE (Emperor Nero), CHAR LVS (Charlemagne) and OTAVANO (Emperor Octavian), the reverse with concentric bands of ornament, the center dated 1555, with a partial label printed and inscribed 'P. [4]8 / E. de R / 123(?)' for Édouard de Rothschild
17 5⁄8 in. (44.8 cm.) diameter

Provenance

Baron Alphonse de Rothschild (1827-1905).
Baron Édouard de Rothschild (1868-1949).
Confiscated from the above by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg following the Nazi occupation of France (ERR inv. no. R 4053).
Recovered by the Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives Section.
Returned to France on 9 January 1946 and restituted to the Rothschild family.
By descent to the present owners.

Literature

Collections de M. le baron Alphonse de Rothschild, circa 1900 (n.d.), Vol. I.

Conditions of sale

Lot Essay

The reverse of the present charger is related to a group of large chargers with elaborate concentric bands of ornament on their reverses. See Timothy Wilson, The Golden Age of Italian Maiolica-Painting, Turin, 2018, pp. 164-165 for a list of the group of istoriato pieces which all have related reverses. Unlike the pieces in the group, which are all painted with ambitious istoriato scenes over the entire surface, a large portion of the present lot is decorated a quartieri, a style found more typically on albarelli and vases.

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