A Worcester (Barr, Flight and Barr) Pink-Ground Three Vase Garniture, Circa 1810
No reserve
Lot Closed
February 1, 05:58 PM GMT
Estimate
5,000 - 7,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
A Worcester (Barr, Flight and Barr) Pink-Ground Three Vase Garniture, Circa 1810
of classical urn shapes, the central vase with a cover surmounted with a flame finial, with double entwined serpent handles, applied at the rims with rows of white 'pearls', on spreading stems and square bases, painted with scenes from William Cowper's poem The Task, reserved on a pink-ground and a white band enriched with gilt grotesque scrollwork, scene script titles in iron-red, impressed crowned BFB marks, central vase with script mark in iron-red referring to Coventry Street address. 4 pieces
height of tallest 9 in.
22.8 cm
Sotheby's New York, 19 October 1994, lot 143
Sotheby's New York, 9 April 1999, lot 405
'The Task' written in 1785 by English poet William Cowper (1731-1800) is the inspiration for the scenes on the present vases, and are inscribed as follows, on the larger vase:
'-a sportive train,"
"To gather kingcups in the yellow mead,-Cowper'
On the first small vase:
'-and neatly tied,
Are wedded thus like beauty to old age,
For interest sake, the living to the dead. Cowper'
and on the second small vase:
'-in [?]
"The head modest and ingenuous worth,
"That blush'd at its own praise;-" Cowper.'
A blue-ground five vase garniture, the central three otherwise identical in all respect to the present garniture, is illustrated in Henry Sandon, Flight and Barr Worcester Porcelain 1783-1840, Woodbridge 1978, p. 114, pl. 106.
