JVV 0559
Utrecht, circa 1770
The two square plaques have indented corners and are painted in polychrome with a shepherd and a shepherdess in a landscape. The decor is painted diagonally so that the plaques have to be hung diagonally. Two holes for suspension are pierced at the top of each plaque.
The seated shepherdess faces to her left and holds a fish by the tail in her raised left hand. In her right hand, she holds the handle of a woven wicker basket resting on her right knee. She wears a green hat and is dressed in a yellow skirt with a green-white and purple striped jacket. The shepherd is fishing, looking intently at his float.
The shepherd wears a green, tricoloured stitch and is dressed in a half-length purple overcoat with green inner lining and turned up sleeves. He is wearing yellow knee-length trousers with matching yellow jacket under the overcoat. His white stockings stand out against his dark shoes.
The rims of the plaques are asymmetrically embossed and consist of volutes and floral and foliate scrolls on a ground of trellis-work. The asymmetry of the border decor is characteristic of the rococo period, and thus the plaques can be dated around 1770.
Dimensions: height 28.8 cm / 11.3 in., width 28.8 cm / 11.3 in.
Similar examples
There is a pair of plaques with the same decor and border in the Stadtmuseum Wiesbaden, Germany.
Explanatory note
The representations of a fishing shepherd and a shepherdess holding a fish can be assigned a romantic, even slightly erotic meaning. The man is angling for a woman who, looking at the man, seems to want to say: “Here I am, and I am an excellent catch”. Such a pair of plaques makes an excellent gift for a young couple who have just become engaged or married.
If we compare the embossed rims on these plaques with the rims of Delft plaques, another special feature becomes clear: Delft plaques have less sharp relief rims because they are formed in a mould.The rims of these Utrecht plaques are too sharp for that. We know that no moulds were used in Utrecht tile factories; relief on plaques was done by hand. When a rim of a plaque did not need to be too intricate, a handy tile maker could carry it out in their own tile workshop. However, the quality of the relief on these plaques is so high that outside help must have been sought. There is one type of craftsman who could do this, namely a plasterer, also called a ‘white worker’. They were specialists in applying stucco decorations in relief on walls and ceilings of residential houses, decorations that were extremely popular in the Rococo period. Presumably, such a specialist designed the rims of these plaques for a Utrecht tile factory.
