BY MATTHEW BOULTON, CIRCA 1775

Details

A PAIR OF GEORGE III ORMOLU-MOUNTED BLUE-JOHN CANDLE-VASES
BY MATTHEW BOULTON, CIRCA 1775
Each with a spirally cast finial-capped locking lid, everting to a gadrooned candle-nozzle, the ovoid blue-john bodies with ram's masks to the sides supporting laurel swags with pierced leaf-tip bases on a stepped plinth with ball feet, one inscribed to the underside Blue John Stone, slight differences in height
8 in. (20 cm.) high (2)

Literature

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE
N. Goodison, Matthew Boulton: Ormolu, London, 2002, p. 333, figs. 332-333.

Lot Essay

The 'goat's head vase' is derived from a sketch illustrated in the Firm's pattern books. The model was one of the most popular of the smaller vases and first appeared in 1769 when a Mrs Yeats ordered '1 pair of goat's head vauses light blue cheny or enamelled'. In the same year, Sir William Guise ordered a pair with blue-john bodies. Other buyers of goat's head vases include Lord Digby in 1774 and Lord Scarsdale in 1772, who paid £4 4s a pair. Several models appear with 'antique' medallions, depicting the head of Alexander the Great, suspended from the rim of the each vase (Goodison, op. cit., pp. 331-333). A virtually identical pair of vases was recently sold The Property of a Gentleman, Christie's, London, 9 June 2005, lot 217.

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