Tall two-handled vase: C.31-2023

Titles

Tall two-handled vase

Maker(s)

Pottery: Della Robbia Pottery
Sgraffito artist: Pierce, Aphra Jane
Sgraffito artist: Woodhouse, Violet (Perhaps)

Entities

• Vase
• Flask

Categories

• Glazed earthenware
• Art Pottery

Description

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

Red earthenware vase of elongated bulbous shape tapering to narrow neck, joined by a rounded bulge; two opposed strap handles from lower neck to shoulder. Decorated with cream slip and a sgraffito design. On each side, a barefoot maid in cream and ochre-yellow dancing amongst cream birds, framed by green stylised leaves, on a watery sky-blue ground. Between these, stylised leaves and flowers in green and cream on a manganese brown ground. Handles pale turquoise green. Bands of decoration in blue, turquoise green and ochre around the base and neck. Underside slip-coated and glazed within a slightly raised 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

Victoria
Circa 1894 CE - 1899 CE

Note

Aphra Jane Pierce b.1870, at Della Robbia c.1894-1899 as a sgraffito artist specialised in designs featuring young women, children, angels or cherubs garlanded by flowers and leaves, often using a cream/yellow palette. In 1897 The Magazine of Art described her as ‘a designer of striking originality’. She later worked for Doulton. The second mark, ‘V’ , perhaps indicates that the sides of the vase were decoraterd by Violet Woodhouse, at the pottery c.1895-1900 and known for her simple linear leaf and stem shapes.

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.