Sophie von der Goltz
Head of Sale
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Lot 269
A Meissen butter box and cover from the 'Red Dragon Service', circa 1740-50
6 December 2018, 16:00 GMT
London, New Bond StreetSold for £5,000 inc. premium
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Sebastian Kuhn
Department Director
Nette Megens
Head of Department, Director
A Meissen butter box and cover from the 'Red Dragon Service', circa 1740-50
Decorated in iron-red and gilding with dragons alternating with auspicious symbols around the rim of the cover, two phoenixes encircling the flower finial, two further dragons on the side of the box flanking S-scroll handles, 16.8cm across handles, crossed swords mark in underglaze-blue, initials K. H. K. in purple enamel (for Königliche Hof-Küche) (2)
Footnotes
Provenance:
Saxon Royal Court Pantry, Dresden;
Anon. sale, Christie's London, 7 July 1969, lot 120;
Reuter Collection, sold Sotheby Parke Bernet New York, 6 June 1973, lot 23;
Henry Ford II Collection, sold by Sotheby's on the grounds of Turville Grange, Turville Heath, Henley, 5 December 1988, lot 221
For a detailed discussion of the origins and history of the 'Red Dragon' service, see Julia Weber, Meißener Porzellane mit Dekoren nach ostasiatischen Vorbildern, vol. 2 (2013), pp. 246-254. The decoration, based upon a Japanese original (Weber, op. cit., ill. 39; U. Pietsch/C. Banz, Triumph der blauen Schwerter (2010), no. 189), may have been produced as early as Summer 1729, for the Paris merchant, Rudolph Lemaire, who planned to pass off the copies of Asian porcelain that he ordered at Meissen in Paris as the more costly originals. After the Lemaire plot was uncovered, the porcelain that he ordered was confiscated to the Japanese Palace. While some was initially allowed to be sold to the public (Weber, p. 248), it is probable that Augustus the Strong reserved the pattern for the sole use of the Court shortly before his death on 1st February 1733. At the beginning of November 1734 his successor, Augustus III, chose the 'Red Dragon' pattern to decorate the first Dresden court service of Meissen porcelain. The first of many deliveries followed in 1735, with further deliveries throughout the 18th and 19th centuries.
The 1764 inventory of the Dresden court kitchen lists butter boxes with covers in two sizes (see Weber, op. cit., vol. I (2013), p. 149).
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