Sammlung Oppenheimer | Important Meissen Porcelain

A Meissen Augustus Rex yellow-ground chocolate cup and saucer, Circa 1727

Guaranteed Property

Auction Closed

September 14, 05:54 PM GMT

Estimate

5,000 - 7,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

A Meissen Augustus Rex yellow-ground chocolate cup and saucer, Circa 1727

reserved on the cup with a gilt-edged shaped quatrefoil cartouche painted, probably by J. G. Höroldt, with a figure standing in a garden holding a fan in one hand and with a bird perched on his finger of his other, the saucer with a similar figure wearing a head covering and holding a fan, AR marks within concentric circles in underglaze-blue, engraved Japanese Palace inventory number N. 117 W.

Diameter of saucer: 4⅞ in.

12.4 cm

The Royal Collections of Saxony, Japanese Palace, Dresden;

Porzellane und Waffen aus den Kgl. Sächsischen Sammlungen in Dresden, Rudolph Lepke's Kunst-Auctions-Haus, Berlin, October 7-8, 1919, lot 198, pl. 15, the saucer only, (sold for 16 800 Mark);

Margarethe (née Knapp, 1878-1949) and Dr. Franz (1871-1950) Oppenheimer, Berlin & Vienna (no. 332 in red);

Dr. Fritz Mannheimer (1890-1939), Amsterdam & Paris, inv. no. Por. 365 (acquired between 1936 and 1939);

Dienststelle Mühlmann, The Hague (acquired from the Estate of the above in 1941 on behalf of the Sonderauftrag Linz for the proposed Führermuseum);

On deposit at Kloster Stift Hohenfurth;

On deposit at Salzbergwerk Bad Aussee;

Recovered from the above by Allied Monuments Officers and transferred to the Central Collecting Point Munich (MCCP inv. no. 1475/4);

Repatriated from the above to Holland between 1945 and 1949;

Loaned by the Dutch State to the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam in 1952 and transferred to the museum in 1960;

Restituted by the above to the heirs of Margarethe and Franz Oppenheimer in 2021

Franz Kieslinger, Verzeichnis der Restbestände der Sammlung Mannheimer, [S.I.], 1941, p. 27, cat. no. 208

W.B. Honey, Dresden China, an introduction to the study of Meissen porcelain, London, 1954, p. 184, n. 83

Abraham L. den Blaauwen, Meissen porcelain in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 2000, pp. 116-17, cat. no. 67

This chocolate cup and saucer was originally part of a set of six, and can be identified in the listing of porcelain delivered to the Royal Court of Augustus the Strong between May 26 and July 28, 1727: "6. st. fein emaillirte Choccolade becher mit 1. Henckel mit gelber Glasur and 6. st. do. unterschaalen", [6 finely enamelled chocolate cups with 1 handle, with yellow glaze, and 6 matching saucers.], Claus Boltz, 'Eisbären und Polarfüchse ./. 6 Kästen Sächsisches Porzellan' in Keramos 148, 1995, p. 13.

In 1770, the chocolate cups and saucers are included in the inventory of the Japanese Palace: “Sechs Stück Chocolaten Tassen auswendig gelb mit vergoldten Zierrathen auch einem Schilde gemalht, mit einem Henckel, 2 3/4 Z. tief, 3 Z. in Diam No. 117”, [Six chocolate cups, yellow on the outside, painted with gilt decorations, also a reserve, with a handle... together with six matching saucers... No. 117], Boltz, 1996, p. 51.

The 1919 Rudolph Lepke sale of duplicates catalogue includes a similar cup, illustrated with the present saucer which is not referenced in the lot entry. Following the sale that cup, paired, however, with a different saucer, entered the collections of Dr. Paul von Ostermann, Darmstadt/Munich, sold by Paul Cassirer and Hugo Helbing, Berlin, October 30 - November 2, 1928, lot 194, taf. 9; and Baron Erich von Goldschmidt-Rothschild (1899-1987), included in his sale at Hermann Ball & Paul Graupe, Berlin, March 23-25, 1931, lot 573, taf. 90. Both are now in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, inv. no. NM 124/ 1940.

According to den Blaauwen, 2000, p. 117, two other cups from this service (lacking saucers) are still in the Porcelain Collection, Dresden, one is on loan to the Schauhalle of the Meissen manufactory, illustrated in Rudi, 2010, p. 225, 6C; the other is badly damaged. A further cup, probably the sixth from the service, was sold at Christie's London, September 30, 1991, lot 264.