One of a Pair of Platters with a Pastoral Scene

Description This round platter depicts a group of peasants resting outside a city wall, one on horseback, with a pastoral landscape in the background. In the center, a gypsy tells a young man’s fortune, and two female figures look down from a portico at the left. This romanticized view of rural life reflects the influence of French decorative art and engravings on eighteenth century Italian ceramics. In the lower right, the platter is marked C & C (or C & G), most likely indicating that it was produced in the workshop established by Carlo Antoino Grue in Castelli. It is painted in blue, green, yellow, ochre, tan, reddish-brown, black, grey, light purple and vivid pinkish-mauve colors, and is heightened with gold. The rim is dark blue and the back is white. To see the pair to this platter, see 48.1759.

Provenance Don Marcello Massarenti Collection, Rome [no. 411]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1902, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

Inscriptions [Transcription] On the front, below the seated figure in the lower right, faintly visible: C & C (or C & G?)

Credit Acquired by Henry Walters with the Massarenti Collection, 1902