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Lot 125

A Worcester vase, circa 1757-8

15 December 2020, 10:30 GMT
London, Knightsbridge

Sold for £2,805 inc. premium

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A Worcester vase, circa 1757-8

Of shallow baluster form with a wide trumpet shaped neck, painted with 'The Mobbing Birds with Owl' pattern, with a long-eared owl perched on a branch, flanked by two other inquisitive birds and flocks of birds populating the sky above a lush, grassy ground, the reverse with a formal bouquet of roses and bluebells and scattered sprigs, 11.7cm high

Footnotes

Provenance
Discovered by the BBC Antiques Roadshow, Beaumaris 1993
Bonhams sale, 5 December 2007, lot 231
Ralph Kenber Collection

The Mobbing Birds Pattern

The many Worcester artists responsible for the Mobbing Birds design clearly had differing abilities. In a pioneering article in Connoisseur in 1963, Hugh Tait suggested the design was based on a combination of bird drawings by C Fenn, including some engraved by Robert Hancock. The fact that an identical composition is known on a Chelsea vase makes it seem more likely Worcester copied Chelsea, and therefore by extension the pattern and shapes derive ultimately from Meissen. These two vases in the Kenber Collection are painted in an almost cartoon-like style, their comical manner far removed from the signed mug in the British Museum that forever links the name I.Rogers to this group.

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