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The Mars vase from the planetary vase set of Tsarina Elisabeth
Height: 43 cm / swords mark, impressed number "21" for Johann Gottlieb Geithner (Miedtank in Keramos 232/2016 p. 15), the manufactory's leading ‘Dreher’ and specialist for large vases
Model by Johann Joachim Kaendler, Meissen 1744
Painting by Gottlob Sigmund Birckner, 1745
Decoration by Christian Gottlob Häntschel, 1745
Provenance:
- Tsarina Elisabeth Petrovna, 1761
- Thereafter in the possession of the Tsar's family until 1917/18
- Coll. Siegfried Salz, Berlin (Cassirer/Helbing 26.03.1929 no. 181 T. VII, together with the Venus vase, no. 180, whose whereabouts is unknown)
Our Planetary Vase was an original part of the famous gift that King Augustus III of Poland and Elector of Saxony presented to Tsarina Elisabeth Petrovna (1709-1761) in 1745. It was the precious highlight of the most extensive porcelain gift that the Saxon court had ever made to a ruling house.
The seven-part vase set - consisting of Saturn, Jupiter, Apollo, Venus, Mercury, Luna and Mars - is almost completely preserved: the centrepiece (Apollo) is in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg; four vases (Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury, Luna) are in the Schneider Collection, Bavarian National Museum, Lustheim Palace; the Mars vase is shown here; the whereabouts of the Venus vase is unknown.
