Lot 611
Lot 611
PROPERTY OF A LADY (LOTS 604-613)
A BÖTTGER RED STONEWARE BALUSTER COFFEE-POT AND COVER

1710-1713

Price Realised GBP 27,500
Estimate
GBP 15,000 - GBP 20,000
Loading details
A BÖTTGER RED STONEWARE BALUSTER COFFEE-POT AND COVER

1710-1713

Price Realised GBP 27,500
Price Realised GBP 27,500
  • Details
  • Lot Essay
  • Related Articles
  • More from
Details
Designed by Johann Jacob Irminger, of baluster square-section form, the square-section spout issuing from a sea-monster’s jaws and joined to the body above by a double-scroll support, the spout terminal and support enclosed by an unpolished panel centred by cut dot-ornament and edged with a cut line border, the scroll handle with polished channelled sides, the area between the two terminals similarly decorated, the underside of the footrim polished and the centre cut with a polished dot, the the domed cover cut with steps and angles and square knop finial, polished
578 in. (15 cm.) high
Special notice
This lot has been imported from outside of the UK for sale and placed under the Temporary Admission regime. Import VAT is payable at 5% on the hammer price. VAT at 20% will be added to the buyer’s premium but will not be shown separately on our invoice.
Please note this lot is the property of a consumer. See H1 of the Conditions of Sale.
Brought to you by
Decorative Arts
A Christie's specialist may contact you to discuss this lot or to notify you if the condition changes prior to the sale.

Lot Essay

The form was designed by the Dresden Court Silversmith Johann Jacob Irminger (1635?-1724) who was asked by the King in 1710 (and subsequently formally instructed in 1712) to contribute designs for Böttger’s new stoneware. He created this model of coffee-pot by fusing contemporary Baroque silver models with decoration derived from Chinese originals (the sea-monster’s head is derived from fish’s heads found on Chinese pieces). It has also been suggested that the form of Japanese sake-bottles may have influenced Irminger’s design, as well as being similar to coffee-pots made by Huguenot goldsmiths in England.1The sides would originally have been moulded with prunus branches, but these have been removed by polishing (traces of these branches can still just be seen).  For a stoneware coffee-pot with a polished spout but unpolished sides, see Ulrich Pietsch, Early Meissen Porcelain, The Wark Collection from The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, London, 2011, p. 65, no. 6.

1. By Ulrike Weinhold, curator of the Grünes Gewölbe, Dresden, cited by Maria Santangelo, A Princely Pursuit, The Malcolm D. Gutter Collection of Early Meissen Porcelain, San Francisco, 2018, p. 41 and note 27.
More from
The Collector