A very rare Derby Chinoiserie figure, circa 1757-60
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A rare Derby Chinoiserie figure, circa 1757-60
Modelled as a Chinese boy balanced on top of entwined tree roots, the child wearing a turquoise tunic with hanging sleeves and striped trousers in red and yellow, the root support mottled in green, yellow and brown, (a small looped section of the tree roots lacking, the boy's left hand enamelled over during manufacture), 15.7cm high, patch marks
Estimate:
£600 - 800
US$ 910 - 1,200
€700 - 930

Footnotes

  • This curious model, which is apparently unrecorded, belongs to a group of Chinoiserie subjects made at Derby during the 1750s. This model has been adapted from a single figure of a boy believed to represent Air, which was itself adapted from a boy that formed part of a group representing Smell from the Chinoiserie Senses, issued during the 'Dry Edge Period', see Peter Bradshaw, Derby Figures (1990), p. 47, fig. B33. A possible companion model of a Chinese boy within a gnarled tree is in the Fitzwilliam Museum, illustrated by Franklin Barrett and Arthur Thorpe, Derby Porcelain (1971), pl. 25. A circular hole pierced through the tree roots at the back of this figure may have been intended to hold a painted metal candle branch.

Category: Decorative Arts / European Ceramics

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Contacts

Katherine Wright Bonhams
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Edinburgh, EH2 1JX
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Specialist - European Ceramics