Terms and conditions of use
Tea bowl and saucer
(1760-1765)
- Medium
- porcelain (soft-paste)
- Measurements
- (a-b) 4.8 × 11.6 cm diameter (overall)
- Place/s of Execution
- Worcester, Worcestershire, England
- Accession Number
- 2024.400.a-b
- Department
- International Decorative Arts
- Credit Line
- National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Patricia Begg OAM Bequest, 2024
© Public Domain - Gallery location
- Not on display
- About this work
-
The transfer-printed decoration on this tea bowl and saucer is known as Les garçons chinois, ‘the Chinese boys’, and was probably engraved by Robert Hancock, possibly after Chinoiserie drawings by the French artist and designer Jean Pillement. Pillement was instrumental in the dissemination of the French Rococo Chinoiserie style throughout Europe during the mid-eighteenth century. His vision of Asia was utterly imaginary, a place of bizarre landscapes and foliage inhabited by figures in strange costumes devoted to endless games and pleasurable pastimes.