Baluster form teapots with similar handles and mask spouts were made in Böttger stoneware. This hard paste porcelain vessel is finely painted in polychrome enamels and Böttger lustre with European landscape vignettes and an eagle to the cover. A young Johann Gregorius Höroldt was perhaps the decorator.
The vessel – from the deceased estate of an established client – carries the underglaze blue MPM (Meissener Porzellan Manufaktur) used for a brief period in the early 1720s before the factory adopted its better-known mark of two crossed swords.
It was in good condition, save a restuck chip and other chips to the lid and some wear to the gilding.
Pitched at £1000-1500 in the February 13 sale, it attracted plenty of phone bidders before it sold to a UK dealer bidding online via thesaleroom.com at £14,200 (plus premium). A teapot of the same form with the MPM mark, dated to 1725-30, decorated with a rare chinoiserie garden scene, sold for £128,500 (including premium) at Bonhams in 2014.
It previously formed part of the celebrated collection formed by Gustav and Charlotte von Klemperer that was restituted to their heirs in 2012.
