RARE STOVE-TOP ORNAMENT Bayreuth, circa 1761–67.

RARE STOVE-TOP ORNAMENT

Bayreuth, circa 1761–67.
Faience decorated in overglaze enamels. Modelled as a vase with applied rocailles painted in purple and flowering branches modelled in relief. Painted with a riverbank landscape vignette and surmounted by a modelled multi-flower finial. Unmarked.
H 33.5 cm.
Blossom finial restored.

Provenance:
- Art dealers, Strasbourg.
- Peter Ducret Collection, Kilchberg; acquired in 1977 from the above source.

Two comparable vases are among the historic holdings of the Neues Schloss in Bayreuth (inv. nos. K-5/6-Bay.N.S.), with reference to the present vase (Miller 1994, pp. 152–153, no. 209).
Two further examples, formerly in the Heiland Collection, subsequently entered the Axel Springer Collection as presumed products of the Kiel manufactory and were eventually sold at Christie’s London as Bayreuth faience (3 November 1997, lots 139/140).
P. Ducret suggested Johann Georg Fliegel, who is documented in Bayreuth between 1764 and 1768, as the artist.

The Margravial Faience Manufactory of Bayreuth (1716–1835)

Alongside Ansbach and Nuremberg, Bayreuth ranks among the early leading South German manufactories. Margrave Georg Wilhelm of Brandenburg-Bayreuth entrusted the management to Samuel Kempe, an arcanist from Meissen, who shortly thereafter fell foul of the law. Early Bayreuth faience was decorated in blue, as was characteristic of faience manufactories during their early periods. In addition, Bayreuth developed its "brown ware", a product resembling Böttger stoneware. This costly material was glazed and decorated in gold or silver with courtly hunting scenes and chinoiseries, closely following Saxon models. A particular specialty was yellow ware decorated in silver with similar motifs.
From 1729, the state-owned manufactory was leased by the Margrave’s successor, Margrave Georg Friedrich Carl, to Johann Georg Knöller (1678–1739), who may already have been involved in establishing the faience factory some years earlier. Under his direction, the manufactory developed into a highly successful enterprise.
Among its prominent painters were Adam Friedrich von Löwenfinck, who fled Meissen for Bayreuth in 1736, and Josef Philipp Dannhöfer, who worked there from 1737 to 1744. A signed Bayreuth cylindrical tankard painted by Löwenfinck with magnificent chinoiserie decoration is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
After Knöller’s death in 1744, the lease passed through the hands of several successors (the Fränkel/Schreck and Pfeiffer/Fränkel periods), until the manufactory came into the possession of Johann Georg Pfeiffer in 1760, marking the beginning of the Pfeiffer period (1761–1788). The business remained in the hands of his family after Pfeiffer’s death in 1767. In 1788, it was sold at a forced auction and subsequently changed hands several times until 1835. From 1806, the manufactory also continued operations as a stoneware and porcelain factory.