Chelsea porcelain factory
Chelsea porcelain is the
The first known wares are the "goat and bee" cream jugs with seated goats at the base, some examples of which are incised with "Chelsea", "1745" and a triangle.
Chelsea was known for its figures, initially mostly single standing figures of the
From about 1760, its inspiration was drawn more from
Periods by marks
The factory history, before the merger with Derby, can be divided into four main periods, named for the identifying marks under the wares, although the changes in marks do not exactly coincide with changes in materials or style. Some pieces are unmarked in all periods, and there appears to be some overlapping of marks; indeed some pieces have two different marks. There are also anchor marks in blue and brown,[12] and an extremely rare "crown and trident" mark in underglaze blue, known on only about 20 pieces, and thought to date from around 1749. A chipped beaker with this mark fetched £37,000 at auction in 2015.[13]
Although the first three examples shown here are from the underside of the bases of pieces, where most porcelain factory marks are placed, the very small Chelsea anchor marks are often "tucked away in the most unexpected places".[14] In the group of Chinese musicians, the tiny red anchor mark is visible on the raised base at ankle level, between the woman with the tambourine and the boy.[15]
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Incised triangle
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Red anchor
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Gold anchor
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Red anchor (near top) from the group of Chinese musicians (shown below)
Triangle period (around 1743–1749)
These early products bore an incised
The most notable products of this era were white saltcellars in the shape of
Raised anchor period (1749–1752)
On 9 January 1750 Sprimont advertised the reopening of the factory, with "a great Variety of Pieces for Ornament in a Taste entirely new", and the new mark is assumed to celebrate this.
The next six or so years were the most successful for the factory.
Red anchor period (1752–1756)
As at Meissen and Chantilly some time earlier, imitations of Japanese export porcelain in the Kakiemon style were popular from the late 1740s until around 1758. These were copied both from the Continental imitations and Japanese originals, and some apparently freshly created in the style.[27]
Some tableware was decorated with bold and botanically accurate paintings of plants, known as "botanical" pieces, which essentially take onto porcelain the style of the large botanical book illustrations that were beginning to be produced, and often hand-coloured. The factory was very close to the Chelsea Physic Garden (founded 1673 and still open on the same site), which may have influenced the approach, and at least provided illustrated books as models. Some pieces were copied from various books, including those by Philip Miller, the director of the gardens (the eighth edition of The Gardener's Dictionary (1752) and Figures of Plants, vol 1, 1755) and Georg Dionysius Ehret. An advertisement in 1758 offered "Table Plates, Soup Plates, and Desart Plates enamelled from the Hans Sloane's Plants" (Sloane had set up the garden's current site in 1722).[28]
These innovative pieces exerted a long-lasting influence on porcelain design, especially in Britain,[29] and similar styles have seen a strong revival from the late 20th century, led by Portmeirion Pottery's "Botanic Garden" range, launched in 1972, using designs adapted from Thomas Green's Universal or-Botanical, Medical and Agricultural Dictionary (1817).
The small "Toys", which become prominent in this period, may have been copied from the elusive "Girl-in-a Swing" factory, now usually located at St James's, an even more fashionable location in the West End of London, which was active about 1751–54. This seems to have been connected to the Chelsea factory in some way.[30] Another development was tureens and sometimes other large forms in the shapes of animals, birds or plants.[31]
Examples of fairly exact copying of Meissen wares are the "Monkey Band" (Affenkapelle or "ape orchestra" in German), a group of ten figures of monkey musicians, and a larger excited conductor, all in fancy contemporary costumes. Such singeries were popular in various media.[32]
Gold anchor period (1756–1769)
The influence of Sèvres was very strong and French taste was in the ascendancy. Although many existing types continued to be produced, the gold anchor period saw rich coloured grounds, lavish gilding and the nervous energy of the Rococo style. As had been the case with imitations of Meissen Kakiemon, Chelsea began to imitate the Sèvres Rococo style just as Sèvres itself was abandoning it for more restrained shapes and decoration.[33] Chelsea garnitures of vases became very large and elaborate, some with as many as seven pieces in diminishing sizes. The body now included bone ash, and a wider range of colours was used, as well as lavish gilding.[34] The glaze now had a tendency to drip and pool, as well as crazing, and had a slight greenish tint.[35]
In 1763, George III and
East Asian styles had returned in the red anchor period in the form of versions of Japanese
Evidence suggests that production was low from 1763, perhaps because Sprimont wished to retire. A sale in 1763 included at least some moulds and premises, as well as household furniture of Sprimont. No dedicated sale was then held until 1769, when moulds were offered again.[38]
In August 1769, the factory was sold by Sprimont, whose health had been bad, and the next year it was purchased by William Duesbury of Derby porcelain who ran it until 1784; Sprimont sold the factory in August 1769 to a James Cox. Duesbury and his partner John Heath bought it in February 1770.[39] The factory continued to operate in Chelsea but during this time the Chelsea wares are indistinguishable from Duesbury's Derby wares and the period is usually termed "Chelsea-Derby". A final Chelsea sale (at Christie's) began on 14 February 1770.[40]
Management and artists
The silversmith Nicholas Sprimont (1716–1771), who came from Liège in modern Belgium, was the usual public face of the factory, but there were other main figures, and the precise roles of all of them are uncertain. Charles Gouyn or Gouyon (before 1737–1782) was another London Huguenot silversmith, and also a dealer in porcelain, who was involved in the early years, but whose role is obscure. He has been suggested as being "concerned with the technical part of the manufacture", or as providing the finance, and acting as a major buyer or distributor of wares. By 1749 or 1750 there may have been a rift between the two.[41] Gouyn may have founded the "Girl-in-a-Swing" factory or St James's factory, named after the fashionable street where he had a shop.[42]
Any porcelain factory needed an "arcanist", or chemist who could devise the formulae for the body paste, glaze, and colours, and specify the firing variables. It is not clear who this was at Chelsea; a paper in the British Museum believed to be by Sprimont speaks of having "a casual acquaintance with a chymist who had some knowledge that way", who influenced him to start the factory. Gouyn is one suggestion; another is a Thomas Bryand or Briand, who in 1743 showed the Royal Society examples of porcelain. By 1746 he was living in Staffordshire, establishing a business partnership, self-described as a painter who "had found out ye art of making an Earthenware Little inferior to Porcelain or China Ware"; but he seems to have died the following year.[43]
Large payments to the factory are recorded in 1746 to 1748 from Sir Everard Fawkener, secretary to the king's third son, Prince William, Duke of Cumberland, who had put down the Jacobite rising of 1745. It is not clear if these were on behalf of the prince or from Fawkener's own funds, or the exact nature of what seems to have been a financing operation. Whereas royal investment in porcelain manufacturing was very common in Europe, it would have been unprecedented in England. A five inch high portrait head of the prince was produced, which was an unusual departure from Chelsea's normal wares. In 1751 a letter says that Fawkener borrowed some Meissen pieces to be copied in Chelsea, and was described as "concerned in the manufacture of China at Chelsea", while the same writer adds "I find that the Duke is a great encourager of the Chelsea China". A worker at the factory believed that Fawkener and Cumberland were the first owners, who employed Sprimont at a guinea a day. Fawkener died in 1758, in some financial difficulties, and at this point Sprimont may have finally become the full owner.[44]
Sprimont is generally regarded as the guiding hand of the tableware shapes, which made heavy use of metal precedents. Few of the many artists involved are known. The main modeller of figures was the Flemish sculptor Joseph Willems, at Chelsea from about 1749 to 1766, when he left for the factory at
The leading sculptor
William Duesbury, who bought the factory in 1770, had been a painter of Chelsea and other wares at his own London workshop, which is documented by an account book of his covering 1751 to 1753 which has survived. However, no Chelsea pieces by his workshop can be securely identified.[49] The books record many figures of birds in particular.[50]
Markets and collectors
Much of the distribution of Chelsea and other English porcelain (and fine earthenware such as Wedgwood) was through the "chinamen", already a recognised category of dealers and retailers for porcelain, and "warehouses" in Central London, which sold mainly to smaller dealers and shop-keepers, often from the provinces, but also to customers. Chelsea's arrangements are less well documented than those of Bow, but Gouyn's shop in St James was probably an outlet, at least in the early period.[51] The annual actions were partly intended for the chinamen, with some lots made up of a range of wares to provide a stock.[52] The East India Company had been selling its cargos of East Asian porcelain at auction for some decades. Chelsea wares reached British America,[53] but there were probably few exports to the Continent.
Early English porcelain was soon being collected, especially in the late 19th century, when prices rose steadily. Over the 20th century there has been a great reversal in collectors' interests, with wares from later in the century far cheaper now (allowing for inflation) than they were a century ago, while the rare earliest pieces have seen dizzying increases in value. The sale at auction in 2003 of a tureen in the form of a hen and chickens for £223,650 was then the auction record for English 18th-century porcelain.[54] In 2018 a pair of plaice-shaped tureens of c. 1755 from the collection of David Rockefeller and his wife fetched $300,000 (both sales at Christie's).[55]
Gallery
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Goat-and-Bee Jug, c. 1745–1749, Birmingham Museum of Art
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Pair of dogs, about 1749, height 13.4 centimetres (5.3 in), V&A Museum
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Rabbit tureen, 1752–1756
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"Spring" from a set of the Four Seasons, 1753–1755, 5+1⁄4 inches (13 cm) high
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Group of Chinese musicians, red anchor, c. 1755, height: 14+1⁄2 inches (37 cm), weight: 30.2 pounds (13.7 kg)
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Perfume burner in the form of a dove-cote with prowling fox, c. 1759–1765, 51 centimetres (20 in) high
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"Toy" needlecase with the head of Columbina, c. 1760, height: 4+7⁄8 inches (12 cm). Inscribed on enamel band on mount: NE SOYEZ POINT CRUELE ("Don't be so cruel")
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Porcelain inkstand set, 1759–1769. The style and the "mazarine blue" ground are borrowed from Sèvres.The Walters Art Museum.
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TheFour Elementsset, 1760s
Notes
- ^ Honey, 60
- ^ The Bow factory was granted a patent in 1744 but no examples of its wares predating the first works of Chelsea porcelain are known.
- ^ Spero, 118
- ^ Honey, 16
- ^ Honey, 17–24
- ^ Spero, 120; Honey, 76–80
- ^ Honey, 78–80
- ^ Honey, 76–78
- ^ Lippert, 57–58
- ^ Or at least, distinguished with great uncertainty and difficulty. See Honey, 144–152.
- ^ Lippert, 58
- ^ Lippert, 58, note 1; Austin, 1–3 (including a good set of photos); Honey, 384–385, with drawings.
- ^ "£37,000 clue to another side of Chelsea", by Roland Arkell, 10 Mar 2015, Antiques Trade Gazette; Austin, 2
- ^ Honey, 34 note 8
- ^ Metropolitan photo
- ^ Spero, 118
- ^ Honey, 20
- ^ Honey, 24
- ^ Lippert, 58
- ^ Spero, 118
- Clamator Glandarius, not to be seen in England; Bird guide illustration
- ^ Spero, 118
- ^ Lippert, 58
- ^ Spero, 118
- ^ Austin, 3–4
- ^ Austin, 4; Honey, 52–54
- ^ Austin, 5
- ^ Spero, 120; Austin, 5–6
- ^ Honey, 44
- ^ Lippert, 58, note 6 (whose dates are used); Honey, 30–32, 76; Spero, 120; Royal Collection, Flask "probably "Girl-in-a Swing""
- ^ Spero, 120
- ^ Honey, 52; Austin, 6–7, 132–140
- ^ Lappet, 57; Spero, 120
- ^ Spero, 120
- ^ Lappet, 57
- ^ Honey, 66–68; Royal Collection
- ^ Honey, 68–70, 68 quoted
- ^ Honey, 56
- ^ Lippert, 58; Spero, 120, 128; Honey, 56–58
- ^ Honey, 56–58
- ^ Honey, 16–18, 18 quoted; Lippert, 57
- ^ Royal Collection page on an etui
- ^ Honey, 18–20; Lippert, 57
- ^ Lippert, 57; Honey, 40, 54; Head of Cumberland
- ^ Honey, 13, 42, 268; Lippert, 57; Spero, 119
- ^ Honey, 34, 60. The "Music Lesson" illustrated at top is one of the "R"-marked pieces.
- ^ Chelsea figure, V&A
- ^ Honey, 34
- ^ Honey, 13
- ^ Austin, 4
- ^ Davenport-Hines, 59–66
- ^ Austin, 7–9
- ^ Austin, 9–12
- ^ Apollo, "Now is the time to buy English porcelain…", by Emma Crichton-Miller, 23 June 2017
- ^ "TWO CHELSEA PORCELAIN PLAICE TUREENS, COVERS AND SPOONS, CIRCA 1755", Lot 620, Sale 16722, "The Collection of Peggy and David Rockefeller: English & European Furniture, Ceramics and Decorations, Part II", Christie's New York, 10 May 2018
References
- Austin, John Cecil, Chelsea Porcelain at Williamsburg, 1977, Colonial Williamsburg, ISBN 0879350237, 9780879350239, Google Books
- Davenport-Hines, R.P.T. and Liebenau, Jonathan, Business in the Age of Reason, 2013, Routledge, ISBN 1135177104, 978113517710, Google Books
- Honey, W.B., Old English Porcelain, 1977 (3rd edn.), Faber and Faber, ISBN 0571049028
- Lippert, Catherine Beth, Eighteenth-century English Porcelain in the Collection of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, 1987, Indianapolis Museum of Art/Indiana University Press, ISBN 0936260122, 9780936260129, Google Books
- Spero, Simon, in ISBN 1850292515
- F. Severne McKenna, Chelsea Porcelain: The Red Anchor Wares, 1951.
- F. Severne McKenna, Chelsea Porcelain: The Gold Anchor Wares, 1952.
Further reading
- Adams, Elizabeth, Chelsea Porcelain, 2001, British Museum Press
- Bryant, G.E., The Chelsea Porcelain Toys : scent-bottles, bonbonneries, etuis, seals and statuettes, made at the Chelsea Factory 1745–1769, & Derby Chelsea, 1770–1784, 1925, The Medici Society
External links
- "Derby Porcelain Factory (Chelsea-Derby Period)". Cleveland Museum of Art. Retrieved 11 July 2010.
- "Listing of Anchor marks". International Ceramics Directory.