Large two-handled vase: C.32-2023

Titles

Large two-handled vase

Maker(s)

Pottery: Della Robbia Pottery
Designer: Collis, Charles
Decorator: Jacques, Percy

Entities

• Jar

Categories

• Earthenware
• Art Pottery

Description

Thrown terracotta, turned, slip coated and decorated with sgraffito, underglaze colours and clear lead glaze.

Tall, full bodied pot with narrow everted neck and loop handles from rim to shoulder. Decorated above the mid-point with eight large pink stylised flowers and eight sea green flourishes over a patterened ochre ground. Other parts painted in mottled shades of sea green and yellow ochre. The inside of the neck coloured green and the underside clear glazed within a foot-rim.

Notes

History note: Lent by Rita Smythe, 2018

Legal notes

Bequeathed by Ian and Rita Smythe, 2023

Place(s) associated

• Birkenhead ⪼ Cheshire ⪼ England

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Bequeathed (2023) by Smythe, Ian and Rita

Dating

1905 CE - 1906 CE

Note

Charles Collis (1878-1918 joined Della Robbia circa 1895, then gained experience at Doulton Burslem, and elsewhere. He returned in 1902 and again in 1905. After Della Robbia closed he worked at William Ault’s pottery at Swadlingcote for five years and briefly at the Buckley Potteries in Flintshire. Percy Jacques (1890-1965) joined Della Robbia as a boy before 1905 and later became a master signwriter. His mark is quite rare..

The Della Robbia Pottery, founded by Harold Rathbone and Conrad Dressler. From 1894 until closure in 1906 it produced a range of decorative ceramics in Art Nouveau style and influenced by 15th and 16th century Italian ceramics. Following the principles of the Arts and Crafts movement, pieces were hand thrown and decorated and individual decorators encouraged to mark their work. Typically, designs were set out in sgraffito over white slip and coloured with special fluid colours, formed from pigments mixed with water and gum arabic, which blended with the glaze to give exceptionally bright hues. The marks here indicate sqraffito decoration by an un-named decorator 'ELL', Charles Collis's design; painting by Percy Jacques.

School or Style

Art Nouveau