Street Entertainer with Bagpipes and Marionettes 'a la Planchette': C.25-1992

Titles

Street Entertainer with Bagpipes and Marionettes 'a la Planchette'

Maker(s)

Factory: Bow Porcelain Manufactory
Engraver: Daullé, Jean (Adapted from)
France: Dumont, Jacques (After)

Entities

• Figure

Categories

• Soft-paste porcelain

Description

Soft-paste porcelain containing bone ash, figure of a Street Entertainer, press-moulded, with hand-modelled details, and painted overglaze in polychrome enamels, and gilt.

Soft-paste porcelain containing bone ash, figure of a Street Entertainer, press-moulded, with hand-modelled details, and painted over lead-glaze in blue, yellowish-green, bluish-green, yellow, pink, flesh-pink, dark pink, red, purplish-grey, brown, and black enamels, and gilt. The underside is flat with a few patches of glaze here and there, and a circular ventilation hole at the back. The base has an irregular wavy leaf-shaped outline with scrolled edge, and four areas covered with impressed points. It rises up at the back into a tree trunk with a square aperture at the bottom to take an attachment.
The piper stands on his left leg with his right slightly advanced and resting on the planchette, which is attached to his calf by a strap. The planchette supports two female figures facing each other. In front of it there is a begging dog. The piper holds the bagpipes in both hands and blows into the mouthpiece. He wears a black hat, a blue neck cloth, a bluish-green waistcoat, a pale pink coat with yellow collar, cuffs and lining, and gold buttons; flowered breeches, white stockings and black shoes with gold buckles. Suspended on his back by a black strap is a small brown box which rests on the top of the green and brown mottled tree stump. The dog is yellow and purplish-grey. The figures on the planchette wear black caps. One has a red jacket and blue skirt and the other a pink bodice and green skirt. The top of the base is decorated with two yellow applied flowers and one dark pink one with leaves of two shades of green. The scrolls on the base are picked out in dark greyish-black, and the tuffa-like areas are bluish-green.

Notes

History note: Dr and Mrs Hugh Statham; Dr Statham died 1967; Mrs Statham died 1970; their daughter, Miss Beryl Statham by whom lent anonymously in 1970 (Statham Loan 24-1970). Bequeathed by Miss Statham, 1990, accepted by H.M. Government in lieu of Inheritance Tax and allocated to the Fitzwilliam Museum

Legal notes

Bequeathed by Miss Statham, accepted by H.M.Government in 1990 in lieu of Inheritance Tax and allocated to the Fitzwilliam Museum

Place(s) associated

• Stratford-le-Bow ⪼ Essex ⪼ England

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Allocated (1992-01-20) by H.M. Government

Dating

18th Century, Mid#
George III
Circa 1760 CE - 1770 CE

Note

This model was adapted from a print by Jean Daullé (1703-63) after Jacques Dumont le Romain (1701-81), and example of which is in the British Museum Print Room (1944,10-14,577). An earlier model depicting the bagpiper alone, see C.29-1992, may have been copied from either the print, or the Meissen model of 1741 by J.J. Kaendler, known as the 'Piedmontese Bagpiper'. In this rare later version, the entertainer has lost his Piedmontese character, but is otherwise shown as he is in the print, operating two marionettes, and accompanied by a dog.

School or Style

Rococo