Plaque, majolica, depicting "The Roman Soldier" after Mantegna
- Object Number: 2002.C.446
- Simple Name: plaque
- Production Person: Kirkby, Thomas (artist)
- Production Place: Stoke-upon-Trent
- Production Place: Staffordshire
- Production Place: England
- Production Organisation: Mintons (factory)
- Summary: Plaque, majolica, depicting "The Roman Soldier" after Mantegna. Painted by Thomas Kirkby in tones of blue, green, yellow and brown with a central figure of a man dressed in armour with an orange cape secured at the shoulder, a dagger in his hand and a shield before him, overlooking boats in a river estuary within a wide border of arabesques and grotesques, yellow rim.
- Terms:ceramics
- Terms:majolica
- Terms:18th & 19th Century Staffordshire
- Inscription:
- Credit: Purchased with aid from the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Friends of The Potteries Museums & Art Gallery and a private donation. Ex-Minton Museum Collection.
- Additional Notes: Thomas Kirkby was born in Trentham in 1824. He is reputed to be the first artist to have reproduced early Italian maiolica at the Minton works. This plaque follows the work of Andrea Mantegna (c.1431-1506), an Italian artist and student of Roman archaeology.
- Contact: Potteries Museum and Art Gallery
One thought on “Plaque, majolica, depicting "The Roman Soldier" after Mantegna”
Should we distinguish between the two majolica’s?
The majolica decorated with thick coloured lead glazes (of world wide fame) is different in origin, composition, and manufacturing technique from this ‘majolica’ plaque which is tin-glazed and brush painted with enamel colours (and rare).
Authors have seldom made it clear that Minton developed two distinct products, exhibiting them both at the 1851 and later Exhibitions.
One, they named ‘Palissy ware’ in honour of the great man, almost immediately known also as ‘majolica’, a resounding success, the majolica of coloured lead glazes.
The other, a commercial flop, they confusingly named ‘majolica’, the English spelling for tin-glazed Italian Renaissance maiolica which Minton succeeded in imitating.
One well known author DID make it clear
“Thus, what today we call majolica is in most cases what Minton, and Arnoux, referred to as Palissy ware.”
Paul Atterbury, Dictionary of Minton, 1990