A SOUTH SEA BUBBLE PLATE

CIRCA 1725

Details

A SOUTH SEA BUBBLE PLATE
Circa 1725
Painted in underglaze blue, gilt, green, black and iron-red with a Commedia del'Arte harlequin figure dancing on a tiled floor, a blue roof edge visible above and an inscription reading Schyt Actien en windhandel (Shares and swindle), all within a border of thickly overlapping leaves
8 3/8in. (21.2cm.) diam.

Lot Essay

From a series of six plates, based on an as-yet-unearthed print source, satirizing an early 18th century financial speculation scandal based around French land in the South Seas and known as either the South Sea Bubble or the Great Folly. There seem to have been four different variations made in Chinese export porcelain. See Howard & Ayers, op. cit., p. 234 and Hervouet et Bruneau, op. cit., p. 214

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