A rare Berlin KPM eagle-handled vase with views of Berlin and Potsdam
Model no. 1490, fired in two parts and screw-mounted. Two large pictorial fields to both sides with finely painted views of Berlin and Potsdam seen from above. With rectangular panels of Neoclassical foliage designs to each side. The entire plinth and the eagle-form handles gilded and finely chased. Blue sceptre mark, brown imperial eagle mark, painter's mark with astrological symbol of Venus. The shaft restored. H 48.5, D 29.5 cm.
1825 - 32, the decor attributed to Johann Eusebius Anton Forst.
The front of this vase depicts one of the prettiest views of Potsdam seen from the east looking over the river Havel. The design is based on a signed watercolour by August Wilhelm Ferdinand Schirmer, dated 1824. Samuel Wittwer published the inscription accompanying the painting, which provides details on the exact position from which it was sketched, namely from the "Eckkabinett des Prinzen Carl" (Prince Carl's corner office) in Glienicke Palace (ibid. p. 342).
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Literature
Another eagle-handle vase with a differing view of Berlin in cat.: Carl Daniel Freydanck, Berlin 1987, illus. 25 (accompanying Winfried Baer’s essay on view painting in the KPM manufactory since 1786, p. 34). The author describes Forst’s manner of painting as being of a “solid, consistent quality (…) with finely, occasionally minutely, painted details” (from the German, p. 35).
The same attribution was granted to a further eagle-handled vase with identical décor in the Twinight Collection (cat.: Raffinesse & Eleganz, Munich 2007, no. 110b). Samuel Wittwer also attributes a crater-form vase with curved handles in the same collection depicting an identical view of Potsdam to Johann Eusebius Anton Forst (ibid. no. 110a). Both vases are listed in the manufactory’s accounts as Royal presentations. The identical design of the present vase could indicate that it was a diplomatic or amicable gift given by Frederick William III.