Lot 1037 Dα

This bizarre model is mentioned in the manufactory's inventory for the first time in 1719, the year of Johann Friedrich Böttger's death, under the somewhat understated title “1 moulded tea pot formed as an old man”. The attribution of this unusual piece has been the subject of much discussion. In his catalogue of the Marouf collection published in 2010, Ulrich Pietsch gave renewed grounds to rethink the ascription to Gottlieb Kirchner established in 1998 and instead to consider an attribution either to the Dresden court silversmith Johann Jakob Irminger or the Meissen modeller George Fritzsche. The piece was certainly inspired by the engravings of Jacques Stella, which were first published in 1657. The larger versions of this model which adhere more closely to the engraving, namely two decorative vases today kept in the Dresden Porzellansammlung, were probably sculpted by Kirchner in around 1730.
The polychromy by Anna Elisabeth Wald-Aufenwerth accentuates and even increases the bizarre qualities of this model. She manages to emancipate the porcelain piece from its origins as a design for silver, an effect not attempted by the previous models in white porcelain or with gold Seuter chinoiseries. Her work illustrates the uncanny realism that could be achieved in the synthetic material, using an unusually broad palette of colours for an outside decorator. However, the following published examples show that her developments were not without precedent.