Domestic Furnishings

Washboards, armchairs, lamps, and pots and pans may not seem to be museum pieces. But they are invaluable evidence of how most people lived day to day, last week or three centuries ago. The Museum's collections of domestic furnishings comprise more than 40,000 artifacts from American households. Large and small, they include four houses, roughly 800 pieces of furniture, fireplace equipment, spinning wheels, ceramics and glass, family portraits, and much more.

The Arthur and Edna Greenwood Collection contains more than 2,000 objects from New England households from colonial times to mid-1800s. From kitchens of the past, the collections hold some 3,300 artifacts, ranging from refrigerators to spatulas. The lighting devices alone number roughly 3,000 lamps, candleholders, and lanterns.

The Remmey and Crolius families dominated the New York stoneware industry from the early 1700s through the early 1800s. Both families emigrated from Germany, bringing with them the stoneware traditions of their homeland.
Description
The Remmey and Crolius families dominated the New York stoneware industry from the early 1700s through the early 1800s. Both families emigrated from Germany, bringing with them the stoneware traditions of their homeland. Sometimes business associates, the two families also inter-married. Remmey family members went on to establish stoneware factories in Philadelphia and Baltimore, as well.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1795-1830
maker
Remmey III, John
ID Number
1980.0614.363
accession number
1980.0614
catalog number
1980.0614.363
The Pauline Pottery Company was formed when its founder, Pauline Jacobus, saw an exhibition of Sarah Bernhardt’s ceramics in 1880.
Description
The Pauline Pottery Company was formed when its founder, Pauline Jacobus, saw an exhibition of Sarah Bernhardt’s ceramics in 1880. Inspired by the French actress’s work, Jacobus enrolled at the Cincinnati's Rookwood Pottery studio in 1881, and opened the first art pottery workshop in Chicago in 1883. Oscar Jacobus, Pauline’s husband and business partner, was instrumental in establishing relationships with high-end retailers like Marshall Fields and Tiffany & Company. In 1888, the Jacobuses moved the pottery to Edgarton, Wisconsin, a small town renowned for its rich deposits of white earthenware clay. Although fairly successful for five years, the company suffered from Oscar’s death in 1893. Its contract with the Bell Telephone Company to produce ceramic cups for electric batteries was dissolved with the invention of the dry cell battery and the pottery was unable to withstand the financial panic of 1893.
The company’s earliest wares mimic Rookwood’s signature glaze, combining an underglaze slip decoration with floral motifs. As the company developed its own style, however, it shifted to the production of cream-colored earthenware bodies with sparse floral accents and innovative shapes. This vase, with its pale blue glaze and organic floral decoration, shows an aesthetic that was somewhat atypical for the late-nineteenth century, and was likely made during the company’s Edgarton period.
Location
Currently not on view
ID Number
CE.379662ab
catalog number
379662ab
accession number
150313
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
ID Number
CE.292199.8
accession number
292199
catalog number
292199.8
While this jar is unmarked, it may be one of several in the Museum's collection made by Thomas Commeraw, a free black potter.
Description
While this jar is unmarked, it may be one of several in the Museum's collection made by Thomas Commeraw, a free black potter. Thomas Commeraw established his pottery in the Corlears Hook neighborhood of lower Manhattan in 1797, successfully competing with well known stoneware makers from the Crolious and Remmey families.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1797-1819
maker
Commeraw, Thomas
ID Number
1977.0803.115
accession number
1977.0803
catalog number
1977.0803.115
Favrile glass. Body is of light green glass. Form: shortened ovoid body with short large concave neck and flaring lip.
Description (Brief)
Favrile glass. Body is of light green glass. Form: shortened ovoid body with short large concave neck and flaring lip. Cover is shouldered on its lower side; top has a conical center trumpet shape and terminates in a tapering rod, its end looped back and bent partly around the shaft. Decorated with red-tinted grasses over the entire surface; iridescent. Purchased from Charles Tiffany for $70.00.
date made
1893-96
1893 - 96
maker
Tiffany Glass & Decorating Company, or Tiffany Studios
ID Number
CE.96416ab
accession number
30453
catalog number
96416ab
maker number
x 856 (scratched)
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1914
maker
Macbeth-Evans Glass Company
ID Number
CE.251ab
accession number
57114
catalog number
251ab
Cylindrical, clear, colorless pressed glass jar with plain rim, vertical S waves on its exterior, and a radiating star on bottom underside. Smooth interior has "PAT'D" in raised sans serif letters at bottom. Jar from pickle caster, 1979.0800.01-.04.Currently not on view
Description
Cylindrical, clear, colorless pressed glass jar with plain rim, vertical S waves on its exterior, and a radiating star on bottom underside. Smooth interior has "PAT'D" in raised sans serif letters at bottom. Jar from pickle caster, 1979.0800.01-.04.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1880s
ca 1880
ID Number
1979.0800.01
catalog number
1979.0800.01
accession number
1979.0800
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1914
maker
Macbeth-Evans Glass Company
ID Number
CE.255ab
catalog number
255ab
accession number
57114
John William Crolius immigrated to Manhattan from Germany in 1728 and established a successful pottery dynasty. This piece was probably made by Clarkson Crolius Jr., John William’s grandson. The last potter to work in the family business, Clarkson closed the pottery in 1849.
Description
John William Crolius immigrated to Manhattan from Germany in 1728 and established a successful pottery dynasty. This piece was probably made by Clarkson Crolius Jr., John William’s grandson. The last potter to work in the family business, Clarkson closed the pottery in 1849. This jar is glazed with Albany slip clay which was discovered in the Hudson Valley region about 1830 and soon became a preferred glaze for stoneware vessels.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1835-1849
maker
Crolius, Jr., Clarkson
ID Number
1977.0855.1
accession number
1977.0855
catalog number
1977.0855.01
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1914
maker
Macbeth-Evans Glass Company
ID Number
CE.253ab
catalog number
253ab
accession number
57114
This salt-glazed stoneware butter jar is decorated with hand applied cobalt, and is one of the earliest pieces made at the Athens, New York pottery established in 1805 by Nathan Clark and his brother-in-law, Thomas Howe.
Description
This salt-glazed stoneware butter jar is decorated with hand applied cobalt, and is one of the earliest pieces made at the Athens, New York pottery established in 1805 by Nathan Clark and his brother-in-law, Thomas Howe. Howe died in 1813 leaving Clark to run and expand the company. He established subsidiaries in Kingston, Lyons, Rochester and Mt. Morris, New York between 1813 and 1838. The firm prospered until the end of the 1800s.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1805-1813
maker
Clark, Nathan
Howe, Thomas
ID Number
1977.0803.53
accession number
1977.0803
catalog number
1977.0803.053
Floral, bird, and animal motifs were commonly used to decorate 19th century stoneware in the United States.
Description
Floral, bird, and animal motifs were commonly used to decorate 19th century stoneware in the United States. This jar, made by John Remmey III, features an incised and cobalt decorated fish.
Remmey pottery is often marked “Manhattan-Wells” referring to the firm’s location near the municipal water supply.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1791-ca 1831
maker
Remmey III, John
ID Number
CE.300894.007
accession number
300894
catalog number
300894.7
300894.007
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1914
maker
Macbeth-Evans Glass Company
ID Number
CE.254ab
catalog number
254ab
accession number
57114
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1914
maker
Macbeth-Evans Glass Company
ID Number
CE.252ab
catalog number
252ab
accession number
57114
TITLE: Meissen covered pot and standMAKER: Meissen ManufactoryPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)MEASUREMENTS: Pot: H 4½" 11.4cm; Stand: D. 6¾" 17.2cmOBJECT NAME: Pot and standPLACE MADE: Meissen, Saxony, GermanyDATE MADE: ca.
Description
TITLE: Meissen covered pot and stand
MAKER: Meissen Manufactory
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)
MEASUREMENTS: Pot: H 4½" 11.4cm; Stand: D. 6¾" 17.2cm
OBJECT NAME: Pot and stand
PLACE MADE: Meissen, Saxony, Germany
DATE MADE: ca. 1730-1735
SUBJECT: Art
Domestic Furnishing
Industry and Manufacturing
CREDIT LINE: Hans C. Syz Collection
ID NUMBER: 1981.0702.3 Aab, Bab
COLLECTOR/ DONOR: 192
ACCESSION NUMBER:
(DATA SOURCE: National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center)
MARKS: Crossed swords in underglaze blue.
PURCHASED FROM: Adolf Beckhardt, The Art Exchange, New York, 1942.
This pot and stand is from the Smithsonian’s Hans Syz Collection of Meissen Porcelain. Dr. Syz (1894-1991) began his collection in the early years of World War II, when he purchased eighteenth-century Meissen table wares from the Art Exchange run by the New York dealer Adolf Beckhardt (1889-1962). Dr. Syz, a Swiss immigrant to the United States, collected Meissen porcelain while engaged in a professional career in psychiatry and the research of human behavior. He believed that cultural artifacts have an important role to play in enhancing our awareness and understanding of human creativity and its communication among peoples. His collection grew to represent this conviction.
The invention of Meissen porcelain, declared over three hundred years ago early in 1709, was a collective achievement that represents an early modern precursor to industrial chemistry and materials science. The porcelains we see in our museum collections, made in the small town of Meissen in the German States, were the result of an intense period of empirical research. Generally associated with artistic achievement of a high order, Meissen porcelain was also a technological achievement in the development of inorganic, non-metallic materials.
The covered pot with three lion’s feet carry onglaze enamel subjects of harbor and waterside scenes painted in purple. On the pot there is a continuous and busy Kauffahrtei scene with merchants engaged in business while laborers prepare cargo on the quayside. The cover has a waterside landscape on one side and two men preparing cargo on the other. On the stand a loading quay reaches out over a river with a harbor in the distance.
Waterways formed a major conduit for trade in the seventeenth-century Dutch Republic, and artists produced a large number of paintings and prints that featured everyday life alongside rivers, canals and harbors. The harbor scenes of the seventeenth century represented to the Dutch their success in trade from the Baltic to the Mediterranean and the Far East at a time when the Republic was the most prosperous seafaring nation in Europe. The popularity of these subjects extended into the eighteenth century, and introduced at Meissen in the 1720s they remained in the manufactory’s repertoire until the 1750s. The enduring popularity of waterside and landscape subjects, especially the tranquil rural scenes depicted in prints by artists like Jan van de Velde, held particular appeal for Europeans confined to city and court. Long before Meissen began production Dutch artists realized the potential for a market in prints that led viewers into pleasant places real and imagined. In seventeenth-century Amsterdam there was a flourishing publishing industry to support the production of illustrated books and print series for buyers to view at their leisure. Printed images enriched people’s lives and a series of prints might take the viewer on a journey, real or imaginary. Prints performed a role in European visual culture later extended by photography and film, and they provided artisans and artists with images, motifs, and patterns applied in many branches of the applied arts.
The Meissen manufactory operated under a system of division of labor. Enamel painters specializing in landscapes, harbor, and river scenes with staffage (figures and animals) were paid more than those who painted flowers, fruits and underglaze blue patterns. Most painters received pay by the piece rather than a regular wage or salary.
The pot was used to serve hot broth or bouillon, often to a sick person in the household.
On seventeenth-century Dutch art see Gibson, W.S., (2000) Pleasant Places: the rustic landscape from Bruegel to Ruisdael; Goddard, S.H., (1984) Sets and Series: prints from the Low Countries, exhibition catalog, Yale University Art Gallery.
On the painting division at Meissen see Rückert, R., 1990, Biographische Daten der Meissener Manufakturisten des 18. Jahrhunderts, pp. 134-136.
Hans Syz, J. Jefferson Miller II, Rainer Rückert, 1979, Catalogue of the Hans Syz Collection: Meissen Porcelain and Hausmalerei, pp. 112-113.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1730-1740
maker
Meissen Manufactory
ID Number
1981.0702.03abc
catalog number
1981.0702.03abc
accession number
1981.0702
collector/donor number
192abc
David Morgan worked for New York City potter John Crolius Jr., beginning in 1795. In 1798 he temporarily took over Thomas H. Commeraw’s kiln on Cherry Street near Corlear’s Hook in Manhattan.
Description
David Morgan worked for New York City potter John Crolius Jr., beginning in 1795. In 1798 he temporarily took over Thomas H. Commeraw’s kiln on Cherry Street near Corlear’s Hook in Manhattan. The mark “CORLEARS HOOK” can be found on many of the well-formed jars, jugs and pitchers attributed to Morgan.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1795-1803
maker
Morgan, David
ID Number
1977.0803.108
accession number
1977.0803
catalog number
1977.0803.108
Before becoming an international phenomenon, the Arts and Crafts movement began with the ideas of British artisan William Morris (1834-1896) and writer John Ruskin (1819-1900).
Description
Before becoming an international phenomenon, the Arts and Crafts movement began with the ideas of British artisan William Morris (1834-1896) and writer John Ruskin (1819-1900). Morris and Ruskin believed that the growth of cities isolated urban workers and that mass production negatively affected artisan crafts. They proposed to solve these issues by returning to a medieval-inspired village model where everybody participated in a community lifestyle. In the United States, artisans adapted these ideas into the studio art pottery movement. Unlike their British counterparts, who often focused predominantly on social issues and therefore made objects that incorporated Gothic and Renaissance motifs, American craftsmen developed a cohesive and novel aesthetic.
The Norse Pottery Company created this Scandinavian-styled jardiniere in 1909. Made from an oil-finished red clay, it features designs copied from an archaeological “bronze era” object from Bornholm, Denmark. The Danish potters Thorwald P.A. Samson and Louis Ipson, who founded the Norse Pottery Company in Edgarton, WI in 1903, primarily produced such Scandinavian revival pieces. One year later, the company was purchased by Arthur Washburn Wheelock. He relocated the pottery to Rockford, IL, where it stayed in production until 1913.
The discovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum in 1738 began an international craze for classical furniture, pottery, and glass that continued into the first half of the twentieth century. Archaeological expeditions unearthed ancient artifacts from Greece to Denmark that inspired countless replicas and redesigns. Focusing on the popularity of these historical objects, the Norse Pottery Company manufactured copies of archaic bronze, iron, or stone vases. This jardiniere’s black finish with green decoration replicates ancient copper. Its three dragon-head feet and wingless dragon handles recall the mastheads on Viking ships – a clear salute to the object’s Scandinavian heritage.
The Norse Pottery Company created this Scandinavian-styled jardiniere in 1909. Made from an oil-finished red clay, it features designs copied from an archaeological “bronze era” object from Bornholm, Denmark. The Danish potters Thorwald P.A. Samson and Louis Ipson, who founded the Norse Pottery Company in Edgarton, WI in 1903, primarily produced such Scandinavian revival pieces. One year later, the company was purchased by Arthur Washburn Wheelock. He relocated the pottery to Rockford, IL, where it stayed in production until 1913.
The discovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum in 1738 began an international craze for classical furniture, pottery, and glass that continued into the first half of the twentieth century. Archaeological expeditions unearthed ancient artifacts from Greece to Denmark that inspired countless replicas and redesigns. Focusing on the popularity of these historical objects, the Norse Pottery Company manufactured copies of archaic bronze, iron, or stone vases. This jardiniere’s black finish with green decoration replicates ancient copper. Its three dragon-head feet and wingless dragon handles recall the mastheads on Viking ships – a clear salute to the object’s Scandinavian heritage.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
c. 1909
ID Number
CE.237960
catalog number
237960
accession number
45701
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1914
maker
Macbeth-Evans Glass Company
ID Number
CE.256ab
catalog number
256ab
accession number
57114
57114
TITLE: Meissen three-footed broth pot and coverMAKER: Meissen ManufactoryPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)MEASUREMENTS: H.
Description
TITLE: Meissen three-footed broth pot and cover
MAKER: Meissen Manufactory
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)
MEASUREMENTS: H. 5⅛" 13.1cm
OBJECT NAME: Covered pot
PLACE MADE: Meissen, Saxony, Germany
DATE MADE: 1735-1740
SUBJECT: Art
Domestic Furnishing
Industry and Manufacturing
CREDIT LINE: Hans C. Syz Collection
ID NUMBER: 1983.0565.35ab
COLLECTOR/ DONOR: 240ab
ACCESSION NUMBER:
(DATA SOURCE: National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center)
MARKS: Crossed swords in underglaze blue and “K” in underglaze blue (painter’s mark).
PURCHASED FROM: Adolf Beckhardt, The Art Exchange, 1943.
This three-footed broth or soup pot and cover is from the Smithsonian’s Hans Syz Collection of Meissen Porcelain. Dr. Syz (1894-1991) began his collection in the early years of World War II, when he purchased eighteenth-century Meissen table wares from the Art Exchange run by the New York dealer Adolf Beckhardt (1889-1962). Dr. Syz, a Swiss immigrant to the United States, collected Meissen porcelain while engaged in a professional career in psychiatry and the research of human behavior. He believed that cultural artifacts have an important role to play in enhancing our awareness and understanding of human creativity and its communication among peoples. His collection grew to represent this conviction.
The invention of Meissen porcelain, declared over three hundred years ago early in 1709, was a collective achievement that represents an early modern precursor to industrial chemistry and materials science. The porcelains we see in our museum collections, made in the small town of Meissen in the German States, were the result of an intense period of empirical research. Generally associated with artistic achievement of a high order, Meissen porcelain was also a technological achievement in the development of inorganic, non-metallic materials.
With three claw feet and an artichoke finial on the cover this pot has a continuous band of flowering tree peonies or camelias painted around the belly of the pot and on the cover which also has a foliate border painted in iron-red and sea-green. Stylized butterflies also form part of this design. The Meissen painter has followed the Chinese Imari style in the onglaze enamel design with the pattern akin to the so-called branch or Astmuster. The pot was once paired with a saucer and this popular type of vessel was used for serving restorative soups and broths to invalids.
Chinese porcelain production in the manufacturing center of Jingdezhen was thrown into disarray when civil unrest followed the fall of the Ming Dynasty to the Qing in 1644. The Dutch East India Company turned to Japan where the production of exceptionally fine porcelain was well received in Europe. The Chinese re-entered the export market in the late seventeenth century and by the early 1700s Chinese porcelain painters were imitating Japanese Imari wares for the European and Asiatic trade. With a much smaller manufacturing base Japan could not compete when China began to produce imitations of Japanese Imari wares for which there was a high demand in Europe. By the middle of the eighteenth century Japanese porcelains were no longer competitive in quantity or price.
Original Japanese Imari collected by the European aristocracy was much admired for its opulent decorative style. When no longer imported to Europe imitations of the Imari style gained wider popularity later in the eighteenth century, most notably in the products of the English Worcester and Derby porcelain manufactories. Royal Crown Derby continues to produce a derivative pattern called Traditional Imari today.
For a detailed account of the Imari style see Ayers, J., Impey, O., Mallet, J.V.G., 1990, Porcelain for Palaces: the fashion for Japan in Europe 1650-1750. See also: Rotondo-McCord, L., 1997, Imari: Japanese Porcelain for European Palaces: The Freda and Ralph Lupin Collection; Goro Shimura, 2008, The Story of Imari: the Symbols and Mysteries of antique Japanese Porcelain; Takeshi Nagataki, 2003, Classic Japanese Porcelain: Imari and Kakiemon
For more information on this type of vessel see Weber, J., 2013, Meissener Porzellane mit Dekoren nach ostasiatischen Vorbildern: Stiftung Ernst Schneider in Schloss Lustheim, Band II, S. 201-203.
Jefferson Miller II, J., Rückert, R., Syz, H., 1979, Catalogue of the Hans Syz Collection, pp. 212-213.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1730
1730
maker
Meissen Manufactory
ID Number
1983.0565.35ab
catalog number
1983.0565.35ab
accession number
1983.0565
collector/donor number
240ab
This large alkaline-glazed stoneware jar was made in 1862 by David Drake, an enslaved black potter working on Lewis Miles’ plantation pottery in the Edgefield District of South Carolina.
Description
This large alkaline-glazed stoneware jar was made in 1862 by David Drake, an enslaved black potter working on Lewis Miles’ plantation pottery in the Edgefield District of South Carolina. In a state that outlawed literacy among people who were enslaved, Dave defiantly proclaimed his ability to read and write by signing his name and sometimes inscribing poetry on the stoneware vessels he made.
One of the most distinctive aspects of ante-bellum Edgefield was the presence of a large number of skilled people who were enslaved working as potters. Edgefield was one of only two areas in the United States known to have relied heavily on enslaved labor to manufacture utilitarian stoneware in large-scale potteries. Edgefield potteries furnished the large local plantations with the vessels needed for the preparation and storage of food for the planters and for the thousands of enslaved people working as agricultural and skilled laborers.
While some of the enslaved people performed unskilled jobs in the potteries—such as digging and preparing clay and loading kilns—most were “turners,” performing the highly skilled work of forming ware on a potter’s wheel. At least 40 enslaved potters and pottery laborers are known to have worked in potteries in Edgefield between about 1815 and 1880. Some scholars believe over a hundred more may some day be identified.
David Drake is the only enslaved potter known to have signed and dated his work. He was educated by his first enslaver, stoneware maker and newspaper editor Abner Landrum, and may have worked at Landrum’s newspaper, the Edgefield Hive, as a typesetter. When Landrum left the Edgefield area in 1831, Dave was sold to Lewis Miles, another large-scale pottery owner.
Dave was a master potter, regularly producing massive storage jars and jugs that required enormous skill and strength. About twenty surviving Dave pieces are inscribed with Dave’s original two line poems—wonderful and sometimes cryptic ruminations on topics as diverse as pots, love, money, spirituality, life as a slave, and the afterlife. The poems reflect Dave’s intelligence, creativity, and wit.
The poem on this jar, “I made this jar all of cross, If you don[’]t repent you will be lost,” may be a reference to the Bible, Acts 2: 14-42, Peter’s speech at Pentecost in the temple of Herod at Jerusalem. This jar, the last known poem piece, emphasizes the importance of religion and the afterlife in the daily life of many slaves. John Michael Vlach highlights this jar in The Afro-American Tradition in Decorative Arts, conjecturing that its “highly poignant verse” reflects "Dave’s combined feelings about slavery and religion.” On the reverse side, the jar is inscribed “May 3, 1862/ LM Dave.”
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1862-05-03
maker
Drake, David
ID Number
1996.0344.01
catalog number
1996.0344.01
accession number
1996.0344
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
ID Number
CE.292199.6ab
accession number
292199
catalog number
292199.6ab
TITLE: Meissen jar and coverMAKER: Meissen ManufactoryPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)MEASUREMENTS: H. 4⅜" 11.1cm; D.
Description
TITLE: Meissen jar and cover
MAKER: Meissen Manufactory
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: ceramic, porcelain (overall material)
MEASUREMENTS: H. 4⅜" 11.1cm; D. 3⅝" 9.2cm
OBJECT NAME: Covered jar
PLACE MADE: Meissen, Saxony, Germany
DATE MADE: 1740-1750
SUBJECT:
Art
Domestic Furnishing
Industry and Manufacturing
CREDIT LINE: Hans C. Syz Collection
ID NUMBER: 1989.0715.02 a,b
COLLECTOR/ DONOR: 332 a,b
ACCESSION NUMBER:
(DATA SOURCE: National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center)
MARKS: Crossed swords in underglaze blue; “A” in gold; “10” impressed.
PURCHASED FROM: Adolf Beckhardt, The Art Exchange, New York, 1943.
This covered jar is from the Smithsonian’s Hans Syz Collection of Meissen Porcelain. Dr. Syz (1894-1991) began collecting in the early years of World War II, when he purchased eighteenth-century Meissen table wares from the Art Exchange run by the New York dealer Adolf Beckhardt (1889-1962). Dr. Syz, a Swiss immigrant to the United States, collected Meissen porcelain while engaged in a professional career in psychoanalysis and the research of human behavior. He believed that cultural artifacts have an important role to play in enhancing our awareness and understanding of human creativity and its communication among peoples. His collection grew to represent this conviction.
The invention of Meissen porcelain, declared over three hundred years ago early in 1709, was a collective achievement that represents an early modern precursor to industrial chemistry and materials science. The porcelains we see in our museum collections, made in the small town of Meissen in the German States, were the result of an intense period of empirical research. Generally associated with artistic achievement of a high order, Meissen porcelain was also a technological achievement in the development of inorganic, non-metallic materials.
This covered jar has overglaze enamel painted scenes based on the fêtes galantes .The French artist Jean Antoine Watteau (1684-1721) developed the subject of the fêtes galantes from the outdoor entertainments in private and public pleasure parks that represent youthful elite society removed from the conventions of court protocol. Watteau’s works depicted conversational, theatrical, and amorous encounters set in idealized pastoral surroundings where the fleeting nature of temporal pleasures hangs over the delicately poised gatherings, and they struck a chord with living protagonists.
In the early 1740s the Meissen manufactory began to acquire collections of copperplate engravings on which the Meissen painters based their “Watteauszenen” (Watteau scenes), and they became so much in demand that eleven painters were appointed to specialize in work on this theme.
Solitary figures of a man and a woman in pastoral settings appear on the cover. On the jar there is a woman seated on the ground holding a rose with a young girl beside her, while on the reverse an elegant young couple rest on the ground before a stone plinth. The young couple came from an engraving after Watteau’s painting Les Champs Elysées, possibly from a print by Nicolas-Henri Tardieu (1674-1749) in the collection of engravings after Watteau published by Jean de Jullienne (1686-1766).
The Meissen manufactory operated under a system of division of labor. Flower and fruit painters were paid less than workers who specialized in figures and landscapes, and most painters received pay by the piece rather than a regular wage. Ornamental gold painting and polishing was the work of other specialists in the manufactory’s painting division.
On Antoine Watteau see Thomas Crow, 1985, Painters and Public Life in Eighteenth-Century Paris, chapter II, ‘Fêtes Galantes and Fêtes Publiques’, pp. 55-75. See also Sheriff, M. D., (ed.) 2006, Antoine Watteau: Perspectives on the Artist and the Culture of His Time.
On the painting division at Meissen see Rückert, R., 1990, Biographische Daten der Meissener Manufakturisten des 18. Jahrhunderts, pp. 134-136.
Hans Syz, J. Jefferson Miller II, Rainer Rückert, 1979, Catalogue of the Hans Syz Collection: Meissen Porcelain and Hausmalerei, pp. 344-345.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1740-1750
1740-1750
maker
Meissen Manufactory
ID Number
1989.0715.02ab
catalog number
1989.0715.02ab
accession number
1989.0715
collector/donor number
332
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
unknown
c. 1900
ID Number
CE.379707
catalog number
379707
accession number
150313

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