Double Red Anchor Mark
Provenance: coll. Ing. G. Gatti-Casazza
Literature: N. Barbantini, Le porcellane di Venezia e delle Nove,
exhibition catalogue, Venice, 1936, pg. 36 nn. 25-27, plate LXVI fig. 199
Condition: excellent
The oval sugar bowl is bearing a cover with a fruit finial; the body bears ribs.The whole surface is depicted with oriental figurines within bands with golden waves alternated to flowered branches. Cups and small dishes are decorated en suite. These objects are marked with the typical red anchor which in this case bears the double ring: a mark reserved for the most precious objects.
Related examples at Cà Rezzonico (cfr. F. Pedrocco, La Porcellana di Venezia nel ’700. Vezzi, Hewelcke, Cozzi, exhibition catalogue,Venice, Marsilio, 1997, fig. 34-35).
Porcelain is also known as “white gold” because of its value and of the appreciation ever since granted to it: as fragile as glass, as hard as diamonds, shiny as a mirror and pure as crystal, it can also be painted with the elegance and precision typical of miniatures.
In Venice the Cozzi manufactory, established by the ingeniousness of Geminiano and Vincenzo, was able to meet the requests of refined and cultured customers as well as those of a broadening market that began to include also patricianship and the emerging rich middle class. The Laguna manufactory, using the authoritative words of Marchetto and Pedrocco, always managed to distinguish itself reaching, “… as for the quality of the products and for the fantasy of their decorations, the highest level within the European eighteenth century production.”
Small masterpieces, “…precious objects which accompanied in their daily life the generation of Longhi, Guardi, Goldoni and Casanova, protagonists of an elegant and refined way of living, holidays in villas, conversations in foyers e and cafés….”