A large and fine Italian maiolica drug jar or 'vaso a palla' with two male portrait busts, workshop of Maestro Domenico, Venice, 3rd quarter 16th C.

H.: 36 cm

Ref.: 
- Christie's London, 22 April 2008, lot 22 for a closely related example. (sold GBP 26.900,00) (link)
- Christie's London, 6 December 2004, lot 335 for a closely related example. (sold GBP 17.925,00) (link)
- The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, object number C.244-1991 for a closely related example. (link)

Maestro Domenego was probably born in the early 1520s as he was already married to Catharina, eldest daughter of the potter Maestro Jacomo of Pesaro, when the latter made his will in January 1544. It is assumed that he worked in the family business in Venice until the deaths of Jacomo and his son Gasparo within a few months of each other in 1546 and then set up his own workshop. He was probably the 'domenego depentor over bochaler' (painter or potter) who was a beneficiary of the will, dated 22 December 1547, of a Venetian painter, Zouan Maria fu Giambattista della Giudecca. His documentary pieces range in date from 1562 to 1568/9 and two of them dated 1568 are signed as made in a workshop in the San Polo area. He probably died between 1568 and 1574, as his name does not appear in the register of deaths of the parish of San Polo which began in 1575, unless he moved elsewhere. His workshop produced dishes, and huge numbers of albarelli and bulbous storage jars, many of them decorated in a distinctive male or female busts enclosed by scrolled frames surrounded by foliage reserved in a blue ground. (Courtesy of The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge)

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(UV-checked)
- The top rim has a few typical small superficial chips, otherwise in excellent condition.

Price incl. premium: € 22.100