Johann Joachim Kaendler, Johann Friedrich Eberlein, Peter Reinicke, Jean-Baptiste van Mour (nach), Nicolas Lancret, Antoine-Robert Bunon
Vincennes Porcelain Factory (flowers); Meissen Porcelain Factory (figures); Paris (Bronze mount and movement), ca 1744 and 1787
Fire-gilt bronze (ormolu), soft-paste porcelain with onglaze colours, hard-paste porcelain with onglaze colours and gold
55,5 x 35,0 x 22,3 cm
Inv.-Nr. 66/211
Given by the Freundeskreis des Bayerischen Nationalmuseums in 1966
Gallery 37
Meissen porcelain figures were sold in large numbers to Paris, where they, like East Asian porcelain, were combined with precious ormolu mounts and French porcelain flowers to make ornate candelabra, wall sconces for candles or – as here – clock cases. Provided that the combination is original, the Paris bronzes, which bear an assay stamp, are important for dating the porcelain figures and flowers mounted on them. Decorative criteria were followed in the choice of motifs juxtaposed here: a group with a harlequin and a lady feeding a parrot is flanked by the figure of a Turk with a guitar (after an engraving by Lancret) and an Oriental girl with a mandolin (after an engraving by De Ferriol).