Vienna Porcelain Cobalt Blue Covered Vase
£305
Dating to between 1902 and 1910 this is a finest quality, as well as handsome, good size covered porcelain 'Vienna' vase (often this model is seen without the cover, but it certainly benefits from having one). It is finely hand-painted depicting Venus and Cupid, the vignette is framed by a rich cobalt blue body highlighted in gold with white enamel 'jewels'.
The vase is in undamaged unrepaired original and excellent condition, it stands 36 cm and is 14 cm wide (unpacked weight is 950 gms).
Based on the marks this vase is one of the Vienna porcelain pieces manufactured from original Royal Vienna moulds used by the Ernst Wahliss Company in the Turn bei Teplitz factory, (at the time this facility was in Bohemia and part of the Austria-Hungarian Empire, (now Trnovany, Czech Republic). In 1894 Wahliss had purchased the Alfred Stellmacher Imperial and Royal Porcelain Factory. (Note: Alfred Stellmacher began working at the Imperial & Royal Porcelain Works in Vienna, but opened his own factory in 1859, in Turn-Teplitz).
Ernst Wahliss was an Austrian ceramicist who created ornate porcelain and earthenware vessels for European elites. Born on March 1, 1837 in Oschatz in the Kingdom of Saxony, Wahliss began his pottery career as the traveling salesman for a porcelain factory later he left to found his own ceramics company, and soon began exporting porcelain goods across Europe as well as retail showrooms/ department stores in Vienna and subsequently London, he was a highly regarded and quality supplier and manufacturer of the finest porcelain with a high demand for his goods .
It was the acquisition by Ernst Wahliss sons' of 600 original moulds from the former Imperial and Royal Porcelain Manufactory of Vienna that began the factories renewed output of old Vienna Porcelain. These pieces are are not purporting to be anything other than production from old moulds by their new owners, marked appropriately as Vienna porcelain (hence the 'beehive /shield mark) along with the EW Turn red mark for Ernst Wahliss.
Historical Note:
Wahliss died on July 18, 1900 in Vienna, Austria. His works can be found in the collections of the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney, the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, and the Museum of New Zealand in Wellington, among others.