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Charger

Ref: 0015
  • Designer / Artist

    After Albert Anker (1831-1910)

    Painted by ‘JP’

  • Detail

    Painted earthenware

    Diameter: 33 cm

    English (Tynemouth), 1878

  • Inscribed

    ‘Study of head / after “Anker” ‘ JP [conjoined] Tynemouth / Dec. 1878’

  • Literature
    Marc Bascou, 48/14 La revue du Musée d’Orsay, “Nouvelles acquisitions”, Paris, Réunion des musées nationaux, 2001, p. 26
  • Note

    This charger is based directly on one by Albert Anker, dated 1870, now in the collection of the Musée d’Orsay (OAO 1383).  According the the museum’s website: ‘Anker and Deck probably drew their inspiration for the decoration from Sir Henry Layard’s book, The Monuments of Niniveh from Drawings Made on the Spot illustrated in 100 Plates (London, 1849).
    The lion hunt at the bottom reproduces a relief from the Palace of Assurnasirpal at Nimrud. However, the scene at the top is harder to identify. There is a winged genie, the head of a bird of prey, followed by two archers and two horsemen. The figures in this part were probably taken from various reliefs. The cuneiform inscriptions on the right and left seem to be fanciful.
    In the centre there is a portrait of a king or a priest, although the horned tiara was usually kept for deities. It is an imaginative creation by Anker based on a figure of a winged genie, the guardian of the gates, such as are found at Nimrud and Khorsabad.

    Anker is not thought to have come to England, so ‘JP’ must have seen the plate either in an English collection, or , less likely, in an exhibition.

    Can anyone help identify ‘JP’?