Buen Retiro group of Italian Comedy spaghetti eaters. (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS WAS UNSOLD.
Exceptional Meissen figures feature at a single owner collection sale at Sotheby’s in London on March 14. The collection of Giovanni and Gabriella Barilla includes some of the earliest Commedia dell’Arte figures and some of the rarest groups of Capodimonte and Buen Retiro ever offered on the market. Venetian eighteenth-century furniture and paintings, sixteenth-century majolica, silver and a group of illuminated books of Hours are included among more than 400 lots.
Meissen figure of a Harlequin modelled by J.J. Kandler. (Click on image to enlarge). UPDATE: THIS MADE £121,250.
Highlights include a Buen Retiro group of Italian Comedy spaghetti eaters c1770 modelled by Giuseppe Gricci (£15,000 – 25,000), a set of four engraved Venetian mirrors (£40,000 – 60,000), a 17th-century Marco and Sebastiano Ricci oil on canvas titled A capriccio of classical Roman ruins (£150,000- 200,000) and a group of Meissen figures from the Weissenfels series. A rare Meissen Figure of Harlequin with pug as a hurdy-gurdy, modelled by J.J. Kandler, circa 1738-1740 is estimated at £25,000-35,000.
Descendants of the founder of the most important pasta producer in the world, Giovanni Barilla and in particular his wife Gabriella created one of the greatest collections of ceramics and porcelain in Europe. The collection is from their residence in Geneva.
“The porcelain collection was formed as a result of Gabriella Barilla’s exhaustive research and passion – guided by the advice of international experts – resulting in one of the most important collections of European porcelain” according to Mario Tavella, Sotheby’s deputy chairman, Europe. “Giovanni, on the other hand, sought only the most elegant furniture for their home, and of which much has been published and originally belonged to Ing. Giuseppe Gatti Casazza, who left most of his collection to the Museo di Arti Decorative at Ca’Rezzonico in Venice.”