A Meissen Porcelain Large Bacchanal Centerpiece, Late 19th Century

The model may derive from an element that was included in the service ordered in 1761 by King Frederick II the Great of Prussia. The service came to be known as the Möllendorff service, named so after the General to whom Frederick is said to have subsequently gifted it. A surviving example is part of a selection of pieces from the service now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, mus. no. C.248-1921. Entries which appear to reference elements of the present centerpiece model appear in Kändler's Taxa or work records for January 1766, reproduced in Ulrich Pietsch, Die Arbeitsberichte des Meissener Porzellanmodelleurs Johann Joachim Kaendler 1706-1775, 2002, Leipzig, p. 153. A second example of this model, adapted with a basket top, sold at Sotheby's New York, 22 April 2020, lot 356 ($25,000).