ATTRIBUTED TO DAVID WOLFF, CIRCA 1785

Details

A Dutch stipple-engraved facet-stemmed wine glass
Attributed to David Wolff, circa 1785
The bell bowl depicting a standing helmeted youth holding a sword in his left hand and a native boy seated on a rock, a caduceus beside him, holding a medallion showing the Dutch lion under a Hat of Liberty in his left hand, both holding a ring, before a large fluted column with a corinthian capital inscribed EENDRAGT (Concord), flanked by bushes, upon a sward, the reverse inscribed T BEHOUD van NEÊRLAND (The preservation of the Netherlands), on faceted stem and conical foot, small bruise and minute chip to footrim
13.7 cm. (5 3/8 in.) high

Provenance

Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, Amsterdam, 13 November 1990, lot 155 (to Dreesmann).
Dr Anton C.R. Dreesmann (inventory no. H-42).

Special notice

Christie's charges a Buyer's premium calculated at 20.825% of the hammer price for each lot with a value up to €90,000. If the hammer price of a lot exceeds €90,000 then the premium for the lot is calculated at 20.825% of the first €90,000 plus 11.9% of any amount in excess of €90,000. Buyer's Premium is calculated on this basis for each lot individually.

Lot Essay

This glass is closely related to a facet-stemmed wine-glass (see F.G.A.M. Smit, Uniquely Dutch Eighteenth-century stipple-engravings on glass, Peterborough, 1993, p. 67, Cb. 9), depicting a boy wearing a tricorn hat and another wearing the guise of an American native; a loin cloth and a sort of headdress.
These type of engravings were allegorical of Dutch unity and the trade with the colonies in the West Indies during the turbulent years of the late 18th Century.

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