A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-1
A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-2
A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-3
A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-4
A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-1A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-2A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-3A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase - image-4

Lot 986 Dα

A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase

Auction 1056 - overview Cologne
13.11.2015, 14:30 - Porcelain, Ceramics, Furniture, Bronzes, Carpets
Estimate: 10.000 € - 15.000 €

A rare early Meissen porcelain snowball vase

Formed of a heavy, slightly grey tinted porcelain mass with some flaws. Comprising numerous individual elements, the foot screwed on. The surface of the vase entirely encrusted with tiny flowers, entwined with vines and with attached snowballs. A parakeet perches on the lid, a cockatoo on the shoulder and a nest with eggs on the base. Blue crossed swords mark. With numerous breakages of varying severity, presumably mainly from WWII, including one to the base, the loss of the smaller bird's tail, the lost snowball to the reverse and a snowball to the lid which has been reattached with glue. H 48.3 cm.
Mid-18th C./ca. 1760, modelled by Johann Joachim Kaendler.

Kaendler first realised his idea of encrusting a porcelain vessel with snowball flowers in May 1739, when he devised a teapot recorded in his workshop records as: "Einen Theepot in Gestalt eines Schnee Balles in Thon poußiret und das dazu gehörige Belege, als Blühten, Blätter und Ästlein aufs Sauberste sammbt Henckel und Schnautze gefertiget" (Arbeitsberichte, Leipzig 2002, p. 62). The idea was so impressive and innovative that Frederick II of Prussia ordered numerous vessels of this design for the Neues Palais in 1762, where many of them can be admired to this day.
This small vase with a cockatoo adorning the shoulder was subsequently modelled during the 19th century. However, numerous factors such as the slightly flawed porcelain mass, the style of painting and the mark all indicate a date of shortly after the seven year's war, meaning that the vase probably originates from the era of Frederick II's great Prussian commission.

Provenance

Private ownership, Rhineland.

Literature

Cf. the larger example with a closed base in cat.: Triumph der blauen Schwerter, Dresden/Leipzig 2010, no. 411.