Lot 188
BOMBAY SCHOOL OF ART
WONDERLAND ART POTTERY WALL CHARGER, CIRCA 1880
Decorative Arts: Design since 1860 | 554
Auction: 3 April 2019 at 12:00 BST
Description
painted with a central panel of a monkey riding a lion and eating a fish, enclosed by a frieze of processional figures, painted maker's marks verso
Dimensions
46.5cm diameter
Footnote
Note: This charger was made at the Bombay School of Art, whose ceramic productions were traded under the name of Wonderland Art Pottery under the direction of George Wilkins Terry, who had been appointed as its first drawing master in 1857. The pottery flourished from the mid-1870s until about 1890, but limped on after Terry's retirement at that time into the early years of the 20th century. Early wares were influenced by those manufactured in Sind as Terry set up his workshop with a Sindhi craftsman called Nur Muhammad. Soon, however, much of the decoration came to be influenced by the cave paintings at Ajanta, and were copied by the Schools students over a period lasting from 1872-1885. The ceramic students also adapted Ajanta motifs, as here, in an attempt by the School to encourage traditions of Indian art rather than European ones. Liberty imported some of the Wonderland wares to sell in its Regent Street shop in London