- Title
- Plate
- Date Made
- 1889
- Medium
- Glazed earthenware
- Dimensions
- Height: 3 in. (7.62 cm)
Diameter: 11 in. (27.94 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2013.193.3
- Collecting Area
- Decorative Arts and Design
- Curatorial Notes
During the 19th century, there was a craze for work by the Renaissance potter Bernard Palissy (1510-1590) in both France and Portugal, inspiring interest in the originals, and the development of revival pieces in the same style.
In Portugal, manufacturing was concentrated in the town of Caldas da Rainha, where, in the 1850s, Manuel Cipriano Gomes Mafra (1830-1905) began to adapt Palissy’s style. The Portuguese Palissy revival culminated with the virtuosic trompe l’oeil compositions of Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro (1846-1905). Pinheiro is the undisputed star of the Portuguese Palissyists. This plate with netted crabs suspended from a nail is dated 1889, the year his company received gold and silver medals at the Paris Exposition Universelle and he was awarded the Legion of Honor.
