A large krater-form vase with maritime motifs
Brass, tin, aventurine lacquer, polychrome oil lacquer, gilding, mother-of-pearl, faceted glass. A vase and cover made from numerous separately worked pieces. Krater-form vase with snake handles issuing from dragon's heads on a shallow square plinth. The neck with a glass set ring, the rounded body painted with tobacco leaves. Both sides with depictions of a steamship and a three-master in large oval reserves inscribed "ANTWERPEN 1855" and "DOOR I.B. BREUGELMANS". The domed lid with a large pine cone finial, pierced border and six mother-of-pearl bird appliques set into the black lacquer. H 82.5, D 44 cm.
Decor attributed to Japan, Nagasaki school, 1855, presumably commissioned by a patron from Antwerp.
The Stobwasser manufactory in Berlin was already offering similarly large decorative vases in around 1820, as demonstrated by the krater-form vase on a plinth in the Stiftung Stadtmuseum Berlin (inv. no. II 72/797 D). However, the north German manufactory never used tortoiseshell appliques or aventurine lacquer. The Parisian Martin manufactory did utilise these techniques, inspired by Japanese models, in the period after 1727 when Guillaume and Etienne-Simon Martin combined their workshops.
The demise of the Ancien Regime marked the end of the demand for such sumptuous lacquered items and knowledge of the techniques also disappeared along with the closing of the workshops. It was only in the mid-19th century when products began to be imported from the Asian colonies that the interest in unusual lacquers was renewed.
Provenance
Private collection, Copenhagen.
Literature
Cf. Richter, Stobwasser Lackkunst aus Braunschweig und Berlin, vol. I, Munich-Berlin 2006, no. 154.
For more on furniture with mother-of-pearl inlays, cf.: Möller, Schimmern aus der Tiefe Muscheln Perlen Nautilus, Petersberg 2013, cat. no. 219 ff.