CIRCA 1743-45

Details

A MEISSEN FIGURE OF HARLEQUIN
CIRCA 1743-45
Modelled by J.F. Eberlein, seated on rockwork, holding a bird aloft in his right hand, wearing a purple wide-brimmed hat with a yellow bow, a plain jacket painted with playing cards and enriched in gilding, baggy turquoise trousers and yellow shoes, a bird cage at his right side, on a rocky shaped base applied with colourful flowers and leaves (restoration to bow on hat, left hand partially replaced, bird restuck with associated restoration to fingers on right hand, right foot restored, minor restoration to applied flowers and leaves, small chip to brim of hat and minor chipping to one leaf, minute wear to gilding)
5½ in. (14 cm.) high

Provenance

With Dr. Dagmar Holz, Königswinter, from whom it was acquired on 12 June 1997.

Literature

Birte Abraham, Commedia dell'Arte, The Patricia & Rodes Hart Collection of European Porcelain and Faience, Amsterdam, 2010, p. 32.

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price and at 20% on the buyer's premium.

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Lot Essay

This model, which is refered to in Eberlein's work notes of August 1743, appears in three different versions. For examples of each in the George R. Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art, Toronto, see Meredith Chilton, Harlequin Unmasked, Commedia dell'Arte and Porcelain Sculpture, Singapore, 2001, pp. 307-308, nos. 97 and 100 (with a cat, bird and birdcage), no. 98 (with a bird and a birdcage) and no. 99 (with a bird and a cat). For further discussion of the use of the birdcage as a symbol of marital fidelity in porcelain sculpture, see pp. 147-148.

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