Peasant Woman selling Apples: C.23-1954

Titles

Peasant Woman selling Apples

Maker(s)

Factory: Meissen Porcelain Factory
Modeller: Kändler, Johann Joachim

Entities

• Figure

Categories

• Hard-paste porcelain

Description

Hard-paste porcelain painted in enamels

Hard-paste porcelain, press-moulded, and painted overglaze in yellow, red, pale pinkish-brown, brown, greyish-buff, and black enamels. The unglazed underside has a circular ventilation hole near the back. The woman stands with her feet slightly apart on a low roughly square white corrugated base.Over her left arm she carries a tall pale brown wicker basket full of yellow apples tinged with red, and with her right hand she proffers a single apple. Her head is wrapped a white shawl, which hangs half way down her back, and is knotted under her chin. Her face is haggard with strongly delineated black eyebrows, and red lips. She wears a white blouse with full elbow-length sleeves; a red bodice with a black front; a greyish-buff skirt bunched up around her buttocks by means of a black belt, from which dangle a black key and a brown sheath, hanging on a red strap; a white apron; white stockings; and brown shoes with red bows.

Notes

History note: Willy Lissauer, Berlin, from whom purchased 28 March 1933 for £25 by Cecil, 2nd Lord Fisher; Lord and Lady Fisher of Kilverstone

Legal notes

Given by Lord and Lady Fisher through the National Art Collections Fund

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Given (1954-01-14) by Fisher, Lord and Lady

Dating

18th Century, Mid
Circa 1744 CE - 1750 CE

Note

Meissen modellers showed the costume of their figures in realistic detail. This peasant woman has hitched up her apron and skirt with a stout black leather belt in order to keep them out of puddles or mud.

This model is attributed to Johann Joachim Kaendler (1706-75) but was not mentioned in the modeller's work reports. It had certainly been modelled before 1741 when an example was included in an inventory of Laubach Castle in the collection of Count zu Solms-Laubach. Some examples of the figure show the woman selling eggs, and it is sometimes described as Farmer's Wife selling Eggs, or Apples.

School or Style

Baroque