The Arnhold Collection of Meissen Porcelain, 1710–50
March 25, 2008, through June 29, 2008
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Teapot and Cover, Meissen porcelain; c. 1725-30; h: 15.2 cm, without cover, to tip of handle h: 13.7 cm; The Arnhold Collection. Photo: Maggie Nimkin |
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The Arnhold Collection:
From Dresden
to New York
The Arnhold Collection, one of the greatest private holdings of early Meissen porcelain assembled in the twentieth century, was established in Dresden between 1926 and 1935 by Lisa (1890–1972) and Heinrich (1885–1935) Arnhold with a focus on tablewares and vases and on objects of royal or noteworthy provenance. Heinrich Arnhold was a member of a powerful banking family with long-standing interests in the ceramics manufactories of Thuringia and Saxony. Married in 1914, the young couple actively collected modern and even avant-garde art while buying early eighteenth-century Meissen porcelain and the work of the factory’s idiosyncratic independent competitors, nicknamed the Hausmaler (home painters). Eschewing the established taste for collecting Meissen in combination with other continental porcelains, the Arnholds focused on Meissen vases and wares of the period c. 1710–45, when Meissen was the porcelain of kings and led the porcelain industry in Europe, a role it ceded only with the outbreak of the Seven Years’ War in 1756 and the subsequent ascendancy of the royal French manufactory at Sèvres.
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| The exhibition catalogue, The Arnhold Collection of Meissen Porcelain, 1710-50, will be available in the Museum Shop of The Frick Collection in late April. Advance orders may be place on the Web site from the Museum Shop. |
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The Arnhold collection came to America with Lisa Arnhold and her family at the start of World War II, and highlights were exhibited in the M. H. de Young Museum in San Francisco in the 1940s and again in 1965. The Arnholds’ son Henry has extended the size and range of the collection, sometimes following his parents’ tastes and preferences, sometimes departing from tradition with the acquisition of Meissen with underglaze blue decoration, figures and groups, and mounted objects. The year of acquisition is incorporated into the accession number used on the exhibition labels, and any Japanese Palace or otherwise significant provenance is also given. The exhibition is presented in the Cabinet on the main floor with the early “red porcelain” production of the period c. 1710–13. The display of Chinese and Meissen porcelain with Japanese Palace provenance is presented in the style of a baroque display. One section of the exhibition explores the new medium and its response to European tastes and Saxon court culture. The other section features chinoiserie-style Meissen, production for the French market, and the independent decorators, the “Hausmaler.”
The Arnhold Collection of Meissen Porcelain, 1710–50, was organized for The Frick Collection by Director Anne L. Poulet and Maureen Cassidy-Geiger, guest curator of the exhibition. It is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue, published by The Frick Collection in association with D Giles Unlimited, London, available in mid-April in the Museum Shop and online at shopfrick.org.
The exhibition is made possible, in part, by the generous support of the Arnhold Foundation.
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