Vase with two horsemen

A vase with a circular mouth and an inverted truncated cone neck and large oval body ending in a base with a flat bottom and ringed foot. The piece is polychromed with motifs traced in manganese while honey yellow, blue and green were used to fill the shapes. The main scene represents two horsemen while the other decoration is of plants, notably the "potato flower" theme on either side of the horsemen. The handles are decorated with addorsed sphinxes.

At this time, around 1700, the potters of Talavera de la Reina produced high-quality polychromed pieces. Their production is characterised by their colouring and, especially, their typical tonalities combined with the intense white of the background, owing to the use of tin. The design of the plant friezes and the concentric circles would also become standards for this production and period. Between the end of the 17th and early 18th centuries, many pieces were decorated with the "potato flower" motif, as shown here, and were almost always accompanied by elegant dynamically drawn figures with a chivalrous theme. The unknown painters of these series give their moving figures the grace of Callot's engravings which, probably, formed part of the potters' working material.