neil guthrie

White portrait bust of the painter in profile. Oval plaquette appears black when placed on a tabletop

When held to the light, the blue colour of the glass is apparent.

On eBay now, a portrait of Sir Henry Raeburn on blue glass by William or Thomas Tassie #c18th #c18 #18thc

Tureen and Stand Du Paquier Porcelain Manufactory (Austrian, 1718−1744) DATE ca. 1730–35 MEDIUM Hard-paste porcelain DIMENSIONS Tureen: 7 × 12 1/2 in. (17.8 × 31.8 cm) Stand: 16 5/8 × 10 3/8 in. (42.2 × 26.4 cm) CREDIT LINE Gift from the Melinda and Paul Sullivan Collection, 2016 ACCESSION NUMBER 2016.9.07

A circa 1730-35 du Paquier tureen and stand decorated with Chinese-inspired scenes within fan-shape cartouches, now in the Frick Museum. You have to love those fish handles. (see ALT)

A screaming head modeled in wax, surrounded by demons and stylized flames

Good morning!

[Gaetano Giulio Zumbo, A Soul in Hell, 1670-1700, Wax, 11.5 cm x 10 cm (Victoria and Albert Museum, London)]

Large conversation piece of grand tourists (the asses of the title) in a ballroom hung with green silk wallpaper and portraits. Chequeboard marble floor in brown, white and black. Patch has depicted himself at the right, brandishing his palette and brush, astride a life-sized sculpture of a golden ass. In the foreground, a dog plays on the edge of collection of silver and silver gilt vessels placed on the marble floor. The picture is in the reading room at the Lewis Walpole.

Thomas Patch, The Golden Asses (1761), Lewis Walpole Library, Farmington, Conn. #c18th #c18 #18thc

New exhibition at the Lewis Walpole library: Caricaturas, Campagna and Connoisseurs: Thomas Patch and the British Grand Tour in Eighteenth-Century Italy (to 15 December) #c18th #c18 #18thc walpole.library.yale.edu/programs/exh...

📖 Parution : Bernard Michon (dir.), "Le café en France
(XVIIe-XIXe siècles). Production, commercialisation et consommation
d’une marchandise exotique", La Geste/Presses universitaires de Nouvelle-Aquitaine, septembre 2025.

🖱️ Lien éditeur ➡️ www.gesteditions.com/puna/le-cafe...

Nice!

The figures have heightened expressions and animated gestrures: one sings from an open songbook, another brandishes a jester's staff and the third plays the bagpipes. Painted in greys heightened with white

Set of three grisaille paintings on leather depicting theatrical figures, possibly from the Commedia dell'arte (French, early #c18th #c18 #18thc), with Matthew Holder, London

Sublime dreams: Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Italian artist, architect & archaeologist, whose views of Rome & imaginary prisons influenced Neoclassicism & Romanticism; born #OTD 1720.
Colosseum, Vedute di Roma, etching 1757 | Plate III Carceri d’Invenzione,etching 1761
Princeton University Art Museum

I’m hoping to find it under the Christmas tree :)

First edition in a contemporary binding, with ownership inscriptions dated less than eight weeks after publication. In each volume is the ownership inscription, dated 20 March 1813, of Sir Maurice FitzGerald, 18th Knight of Kerry (1774-1849). FitzGerald was the husband of Maria La Touche, a cousin by marriage of Mary La Touche. Austen records in her letters that she visited and was visited by Mary and her daughter Miss East when Austen was in London in 1811, 1814 and 1815, straddling the publication of Pride and Prejudice. The three volumes, standing upright.

Volume 1, open at title page with ownership inscription.

Volume 1, open at page 1 ('It is a truth universally acknowledged, ...')

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 1st ed. (London, 1813), at Christie's, New York (est. US$120,000-180,000 - but will go for more). Long #c18th #c18 #18thc

I covet the helmet

A new Archbishop of Canterbury will be elected tomorrow. This image showing four bishops racing for Lambeth Palace illustrated a satirical poem entitled ‘A race for Canterbury: or, Lambeth ho’, published in 1747 (when Thomas Herring succeeded John Potter). @theulspeccoll.bsky.social 7720.d.1680.

Navette-shapped cluster ring with central marquise-cut aquamarine framed by 36 smaller old-cut aquamarines arranged in two concentric borders. The pale stones are set in silver (to enhance their brilliance); reverse of the bezel and shank are gold. Beaded gold border surrounding the stones

Aquamarine ring in silver and gold (Portugal, late #c18th #c18 #18thc), with Matthew Holder, London

Bottle coaster = dessous de bouteille.

J'aurai appris un nouveau mot d'anglais aujourd'hui 😋

Et moi un peu de français !

Percy Shelley: I propose we amuse ourselves with a ghost story competition!

Mary Shelley: no.

Percy: what?! But why?

Mary: I refuse to do anything until Byron takes off that helmet

Byron:

Circular coasters with straight sides, reeded rim and stepped base. Pierced and bright-cut egg-and-dart, pointille, and wavy borders; lion armorial. Stained wood well with concentric rings.

Pair of silver wine bottle coasters by Robert Hennell (London, 1792), with Nelson & Nelson, NYC #c18th #c18 #18thc

Adjustable table veneered and cross-banded in figured mahogany, the serpentine ratcheted top having veneered mahogany over a solid mahogany substrate above a conforming serpentine case with frieze drawer, raised on 4 'lappet-headed', deeply chamfered legs on casters, the front legs with inset wooden casters and split to accommodate extending the fitted frieze drawer; brass handle / keyhole escutcheon, small brass stay at the centre backside

View from the back with top slanted up on its support

Side view with top slanted

Side view with drawer pulled halfway out

Mahogany drawing table with 'racheted' top (able to be slanted), serpentine egdes and single drawer (English, c1730-40), with M Ford Creech, Memphis, Tenn. #c18th #c18 #18thc

"In an interior, a writer is trimming his pen. He sits at a table by the window, above which is a mirror in which the man's face can be seen. An inkstand is on the table, and to the right, a coat lies over the chair." https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/collection/object/A-Writer-Trimming-his-Pen--a4287241d06c3b36fa6e968fb746b827?tab=data

Back to work

[Jan Ekels the Younger, A Writer Trimming His Pen, 1784, Oil on panel, 28 x 24 cm (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)]

A fine autumn morning in Cambridge.

Multicoloured, naturalistic porcelain pomegranate with gilt bronze rococo mount

Inkstand in the form of a pomegranate in a gilt-bronze mount (Chantilly, possibly Villeroy, c1735, with later mounts) ©The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC #c18th #c18 #18thc

One of the numerous versions of the portrait of the Prince in 'Harlequin' dress - that is, an English person's idea of tartan. He wears a dark blue Garter sash and blue bonnet as well as his tight-fitting particoloured suit of jacket and breeches with white stockings. Leaning on a sabre, with a targe resting on the ground. In a brooding brown landscape with a rocky outcrop and a castle in the background. Some condition issues. 74.5 x 63cm (29 5/16 x 24 13/16in).

Portrait of Prince Charles Edward, attributed to James Worsdale or Wassdail (c1692-1767), at Bonhams, Edinburgh (est. £5,000-8,000) #Jacobite #c18th #c18 #18thc

A pumpkin looming in a Tuscan landscape with a inscription that reads "Zucca nata un Pisa nel Giardino di SAR detto di S. Francesco l’Anno 17111. Pesava £160"

Bartolomeo Bimbi, Pumpkin from the Grand-Ducal Garden of San Francesco in Pisa, 1711, Oil on canvas (Museo Botanico, Florence). According to the inscription it weighed 160 Florentine libbre (about 120 lb). #fall

Engraving of a rhinoceros standing on a grassy outcrop at the base of a small cliff

Plate from Carol Fredrik Brink, Nouvelle description du cap de Bonne-Espérance (Amsterdam, 1778), at Ursus Books, NYC (US$2,250) #c18th #c18 #18thc

The "Prentice Plate" by William Billingsley, a sample plate with rose decoration to be used as a guide for other decorators imitating this pattern and style. Now in the Derby Museum and Art Gallery.

I collect mostly French 18th century porcelain, but when it comes to British porcelain we all have to acknowledge William Billingsley as one of the great decorators. He worked seemingly everywhere, but on this date in 1774 he began working at Derby. Here's one of his famous Derby plates. (see ALT)

White marble bust of a man in armour (cuirass, mantle) with a wig of fairly tight curls and, tied with a ribbon, a pony-tail at the back that reaches just below his shoulders. The man's expression is wary, sceptical, perhaps a bit bored.

Close-up of head

Viewed from his right side

Rear view showing the curved hollow below the shoulders where his back would be

Michel-Ange Slodtz, bust of the duc d'Harcourt (1736), recently acquired by the Louvre #c18th #c18 #18thc

Nantes, jour 2. Musée des Arts, Antonio Canova, Le Pape Clément XIII, octobre-novembre 1787, plâtre.

Nantes, jour 2. Musée des Arts, Jean-Antoine Watteau, Le Faune, détail, 1707-1708, huile sur bois.

Small notebooks with fine handwriting

Manuscript notes and character sketches written by Maria Edgeworth in planning her novels; some pages are extended by sewn-on scraps of paper. Amazing to see these, and the original case she stored them in!