Meissen Porcelain Manufactory (1710–present)
Modeled by Johann Joachim Kändler (born Saxony [now Germany], 1706–1775)
Meissen, Electorate of Saxony (now Germany)
King Vulture
INV-1897
Meissen Porcelain Manufactory (1710–present)
Modeled by Johann Joachim Kändler (born Saxony [now Germany], 1706–1775)
Meissen, Electorate of Saxony (now Germany)1734
ceramics
Date
1734
Medium
Hard-paste porcelain and polychrome enamels
Dimensions
58 × 43 cm (22 13/16 × 16 15/16 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Harry and Maribel G. Blum and Kate S. Buckingham endowment funds; purchased with funds provided by the Antiquarian Society; Applied Arts of Europe Sales Proceeds, Charles H. and Mary F.S. Worcester and Major Acquisitions Centennial funds; Robert Allerton Trust; Mary and Leigh Block Endowment Fund; Ada Turnbull Hertle Fund; purchased with funds provided by Harry A. Root; Wirt D. Walker Endowment Fund; Gladys N. Anderson Fund; Pauline Seipp Armstrong, Edward E. Ayer in memory of Charles L. Hutchinson, and Kay and Frederick Krehbiel endowment funds; purchased with funds provided by Doris and Stanford Marks; Helen A. Regenstein Endowment Fund; Samuel A. Marx Fund; Laura T. Magnuson, Marian and Samuel Klasstorner, and Maurice D. Galleher endowment funds; Robert Allerton Purchase Fund; Bessie Bennett and Applied Arts of Europe General endowment funds; Edward Johnson, Elizabeth R. Vaughan, and Annette M. Chapin funds; Wentworth Greene Field Memorial Endowment Fund; Campaign for Chicago's Masterpiece Director's Fund; purchased with funds provided by Maureen and Edward Byron Smith Jr.; Samuel P. Avery Endowment Fund; Hugh Leander Adams and Mary Trumbull Adams Fund; purchased with funds provided by G-Bar Charitable Foundation; Betty Bell Spooner Fund; purchased with funds provided by Elizabeth Souder Louis; Irving and Jane Seaman, Charles U. Harris, and S. DeWitt Clough endowment funds; purchased with funds provided by the Woman's Board of the Alliance Française of Chicago; Grant J. Pick Purchase Fund; purchased with funds provided by Ghenete Zelleke
As elector of Saxony and king of Poland, Augustus II (r. 1694/97–1733) presided over the ambitious transformation of his capital, Dresden, through advances in architecture, the arts, science, and technology. Produced beginning in 1710 through royal sponsorship and funding, Meissen porcelain was an exclusive luxury good of its time. Around 1728 Augustus conceived of replicating the animal kingdom in porcelain for display in a Baroque palace that he was transforming into a showcase for his collections of Asian and Meissen ceramics. This porcelain zoo was intended for the long gallery on the main floor of the palace. By 1733, the year the king died, more than thirty different models of birds and almost forty animals had been made, many by the sculptor Johann Joachim Kändler, who worked at Meissen from 1731 to 1775. Kändler drew this vulture from life, which allowed him to animate his work with the creature’s quintessential spirit. Such porcelain animals remain the most vivid expression of Augustus’s wish, as elector and king, to possess and rule over the natural world.
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Meissen Porcelain Manufactory (1710–present) Model by Johann Joachim Kändler (born Saxony [now Germany], 1706–1775) Meissen, Electorate of Saxony (now Germany)
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Meissen Porcelain Manufactory (1710–present) Model by Johann Joachim Kändler (born Saxony [now Germany], 1706–1775) Meissen, Electorate of Saxony (now Germany)