Peacock (one of a pair) ca. 1755–58 Chelsea Porcelain Manufactory Figures of birds were produced at the Chelsea factory from its earliest years (entry 79), and they accounted for an important category of the sculptural work done by the factory in its first decade or so. The vast majority of birds were made during the Raised Anchor period (1749–52), and it appears that approximately half of all figural models created during these years represent various types of birds.[1] Most of them are small in scale, modeled with relatively little detail, and supported on sturdy tree-trunk bases, but typica

Peacock (one of a pair) ca. 1755–58 Chelsea Porcelain Manufactory Figures of birds were produced at the Chelsea factory from its earliest years (entry 79), and they accounted for an important category of the sculptural work done by the factory in its first decade or so. The vast majority of birds were made during the Raised Anchor period (1749–52), and it appears that approximately half of all figural models created during these years represent various types of birds.[1] Most of them are small in scale, modeled with relatively little detail, and supported on sturdy tree-trunk bases, but typically their enamel decoration animates their simple forms. At least twenty-two of the models are based on plates from A Natural History of Uncommon Birds, and of Some Other Rare and Undescribed Animals, Quadrupeds, Fishes, Reptiles, Insects, &c. (1743–51), the influential publication by British ornithologist George Edwards (1694–1773), which appeared sequentially in four volumes beginning in 1743.[2] Edwards’s renderings of hundreds of species of birds were distinguished by the accuracy with which they were portrayed, including their coloration. This concern for scientific rigor was uncommon, and Edwards helped establish ornithology as a serious discipline. It is notable that the Chelsea factory elected to use Edwards’s prints as a source, reflecting the factory’s serious intent and artistic ambitions. The first two volumes of A Natural History, which provided the sources for the Raised Anchor period birds, represented the most up-to-date and scholarly ornithological research, and the factory’s awareness of new information concerning the natural world was to inform the decoration of the so-called botanical plates that appeared only a few years later (entry 82). The birds produced during these years must have been commercially successful given the large number of models created, but for reasons that are not clear, the popularity of these figures declined in the fol

How we Work

Contribute

Legal

Contact Us