THE MEISSEN PORCELAIN BIRDS CIRCA 1741, FAINT BLUE CROSSED SWORDS TO ONE, MODELED BY J.J. KÄNDLER AND J.G. EHDER, THE ORMOLU MOUNTS OF A LATER DATE AND ASSOCIATED

Kändler created his first model of a waxwing in January 1741, and the entry in his work report reads: Einen Vogel in Ziemlicher Grösse, Ein Seyden Schwanz genannt Welcher auf einen Starcken Aste aufs Sauberste nach der Natur Vorgestellet und nach poussiret ist [a bird, of fair size, of the type known as a waxwing, moulded entirely according to nature]⁽¹⁾. Kändler must have gotten Johann Gottlieb Ehder to complete the companion model as Ehder’s Arbeitsberichte [work report] records the second companion model completed over a period of two months between July and August that year. The July entry reads: Einen Vogel, den Seyden-Schwantz genant, in Thon angelegt [1 bird of the type known as a waxwing, created in clay]⁽²⁾, and the August entry reads: Einen Vogel, den Seiden Schwantz genannt, rein bossiret [1 bird of the type known as a waxwing, cleanly modeled]⁽³⁾. For other examples of this model, see the pair formerly in the Irwin Untermeyer collection and now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (object no. 64.101.37), illustrated by Yvonne Hackenbroch, Meissen and other Continental Porcelain, Faience and Enamel in the Irwin Untermyer Collection, London, 1956, pl. 15, fig. 21, as well as the pair at Burghley House, United Kingdom (ref. no. CER0660).

1. Cited by Ulrich Pietsch, Die Arbeitsberichte des Meissener Porzellanmodelleurs, Johann Joachim Kaendler, Leipzig, 2002, p. 76.
2. Cited by Sarah-Katharina Andres-Acevedo, Die Autonomen Figürlichen Plastiken Johann Joachim Kaendlers und seiner Werkstatt, Stuttgart, 2023, vol. 1, p. 241.
3. Cited by Sarah-Katharina Andres-Acevedo, ibid., 2023, p. 242.