PAINTINGS BY SIR ALAN BARLOW, UNITED KINGDOM, CIRCA 1900

This album documents the collection of Iznik pottery belonging to Louis Huth (1821-1905). Huth was a merchant banker and an active collector and patron of various artists. In 1885 he lent his collection of 27 Iznik ceramics to an exhibition at The Burlington Fine Arts Club, of which he was a member. Following his death, his Iznik collection was sold in the Huth sale at Christie’s, London in May 1905. Some were then bought by fellow Burlington member George Salting (1835-1909).

The watercolours in this album are thought to have been done by another great collector of Iznik and Persian ceramics, Sir James Alan Noel Barlow, 2nd Baronet GCB KBE FSA (1881-1968). A number of the watercolours are signed with his initials, JAB, and his name appears in a later pencil note to the first fly-leaf. Barlow was president of the Oriental Ceramic Society from 1943-61. In 1956 he donated the majority of his collection to the Ashmolean Museum and some other pieces to the British Museum, the Victoria & Albert Museum and the Fitzwilliam in Cambridge.

Many of the vessels illustrated in this book are now in museum collections. The large basins illustrated opposite, for instance, are in the British Museum (having passed hands from Louis Huth to Frederick Du Cane Godmann, d.1919; G67) and the Victoria & Albert Museum (acc.no.1989-1910). Other examples have recently passed through the salerooms – see for example the dish with the red ground which sold in these Rooms, 26 April 2012, lot 268 or the unusual pilgrim flask decorated with animals was sold Sotheby’s London, 25 April 2018, lot 167 (both illustrated here). This book provides a fascinating document of the history of collecting Iznik in the early 20th century.