Dresden Porcelain Double Inkstand

Description This is a late 19th- to early 20th-century German hard-paste porcelain double inkstand (standish) decorated in the Rococo Revival / Dresden tradition.

• The Tray: Scalloped, serpentine-rimmed rectangular tray lavishly decorated with raised and flat gilding. The borders feature a pale yellow/ivory ground with fine gilt lattice patterns and foliate rocaille cartouches. The central reserve displays a hand-painted idyllic pastoral courting scene in the manner of Antoine Watteau or François Boucher.
• The Inkwells: Two matching octagonal/scalloped pots with fitted recessed lids topped by gilded knop finials. The sides of both pots feature romantic vignettes flanked by heavy gilt scrollwork and trellis patterns.
• The Underside: Both the tray and the wells bear the blue underglaze/overglaze factory stamp featuring a five-point crown above the intertwined monogram RK, the script word Dresden, and an arched MADE IN GERMANY export stamp, along with an impressed shape/mold number. The underside of the tray also features an integral curved porcelain strut—a common structural feature designed to prevent large, flat porcelain trays from warping or sagging during high-temperature kiln firings.

Age

• Dating: Circa 1891–1916.
• Dating Evidence: The Richard Klemm crown-over-RK mark was used starting in the late 1880s, but the inclusion of the English-language stamp “MADE IN GERMANY” places its production after the implementation of the U.S. McKinley Tariff Act of 1890 (which required country-of-origin marking on imported goods). Klemm died in 1916, after which the studio merged with Donath & Co. before eventually being acquired by Hutschenreuther.

Richard Klemm History

• Founding: Karl Richard Klemm established his porcelain decorating studio (Porzellanmalerei) in Striesen, near Dresden, Saxony, in 1869.
• The “Dresden Porcelain” Movement: Unlike Meissen, which was an actual porcelain manufacturing factory, “Dresden porcelain” refers primarily to the 19th-century artistic movement centered in Dresden. Decorating studios did not always fire their own raw porcelain blanks; instead, they purchased high-quality white porcelain “blanks” from major manufactories (such as Meissen, KPM Berlin, and various Bavarian and Silesian factories) and hand-painted them with elaborate gilding, floral sprays (Dresdner Blumen), and Watteau-style courting scenes.
• The Dresden Crown Mark: In 1883, Klemm joined three other leading Dresden decorating studios—Donath & Co., Oswald Lorenz, and Adolf Hamann—to register the famous Dresden Crown trademark to protect authentic Saxon decorated porcelain against foreign and regional imitators.
• Merger & Later Era: Following Klemm’s death in 1916, his studio merged with Donath & Co. in 1918, and the assets were subsequently absorbed by the major Bavarian porcelain manufacturer C.M. Hutschenreuther in 1920.