Plate thumbnail 1
Not currently on display at the V&A

Plate

ca. 1850 (made)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

The Ginori company, founded in 1735 in Doccia near Florence, built its reputation on imitations of Italian lustred wares and maiolica of around 1500. Under the Marchese Lorenzo Ginori Lisci (d.1878), director from 1848, the pottery produced designs reflecting more varied and more contemporary tastes but also continued making its successful lustred wares. This plate shows their skill at imitatin Chinese porcelain. In 1896 the pottery came under the ownership of Giulio Richard who already owned other factories. Combined, the new company was known as the Società Ceramica Richard-Ginori.


Object details

Category
Object type
Materials and techniques
Porcelain
Brief description
Plate, porcelain, with Chinese style decoration, Ginori, Italy, ca.1850
Physical description
Plate, painted with figures, fruit and flowers in imitation of Chinese porcelain
Dimensions
  • Diameter: 23.5cm
Marks and inscriptions
  • A 6-pointed star
  • Transliteration
    .
Object history
Bought from the maker, the 'Marquess Ginori, Florence'
Summary
The Ginori company, founded in 1735 in Doccia near Florence, built its reputation on imitations of Italian lustred wares and maiolica of around 1500. Under the Marchese Lorenzo Ginori Lisci (d.1878), director from 1848, the pottery produced designs reflecting more varied and more contemporary tastes but also continued making its successful lustred wares. This plate shows their skill at imitatin Chinese porcelain. In 1896 the pottery came under the ownership of Giulio Richard who already owned other factories. Combined, the new company was known as the Società Ceramica Richard-Ginori.
Bibliographic reference
Frescobaldi Malenchini, Livia ed. With Balleri, Rita and Rucellai, Oliva, ‘Amici di Doccia Quaderni, Numero VII, 2013, The Victoria and Albert Museum Collection’, Edizioni Polistampa, Firenze, 2014 pp. 84-85, Cat. 65 65. Plate with figures, flowers and objects “in the Chinese style” circa 1850 hard-paste porcelain painted in colours diam. 23,5 cm on the back a six-pointed star formed by two blue triangles inv. 5447-1859 purchase: Ginory Factory, 11s 5d The decoration of this plate with figures alternated with precious objects and flowers imitates the export porcelain made at Canton between about 1830 and 1850. We do not have any complete sets of tableware in Doccia porcelain with this kind of decoration, but only individual plates that were made perhaps as exhibition samples or as replacements for Chinese sets. “A dinner plate […] with a green, red and gold band with flowers and figures in the style of Japan”, similar to this plate despite the error in the identity of the Far Eastern country, is described in a list in 1854 (AMD, arm. 1, palch. 2, cart. 1, doc. 2058, Oggetti della Manifattura Ginori spediti all’Esposizione di Firenze) and suggests an approximate date for the plate to the 1850s.The plate was purchased in 1859, perhaps for the purpose of comparing it with the Chinese examples, directly from Ginori together with other objects (see cat. 121, 123, 124) during an expedition of the South Kensington Museum to Florence (WAINWRIGHT 1999, p. 173-174; MARITANO 2012, p. 14). The mark is unusual. At the Museo di Doccia there are two other similar plates which, however, were decorated by different painters, and have the incised mark “GINORI 18” (inv. 322) and the gold star (inv. 329). O.R. Bibliography: unpublished
Collection
Accession number
5447-1859

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Record createdJune 24, 2009
Record URL
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