This early Staffordshire creamware figure is ‘splashed’ with green and amber oxides on a grey shaped base. He is seated scratching his back with a stick.

There are usually either sixteen or eighteen Buddhist Lohans or ‘Arhats’ in a set in Chinese sources, they are patrons and guardians of the Buddha.

The Staffordshire figure could have been copied from a Chinese soapstone figure of the sort that were imported into Europe in large numbers[i], but it is perhaps more likely that is copies a hardwood or ivory model; the thin stick suggests one of these materials.

Lesley Grigsby illustrates a similar model from the Henry H. Weldon Collection which was subsequently sol at Sotheby’s, London on 19 November 1991, lot 102.[iii] For a white salt0glazed version see Horne 2003, no. 03/14

Condition:
Tip of stick restored, section of edge of base restuck, and three chips restored

Provenance:
This figures appeared on Portobello Road in around 1987 where I pointed it out to Jonathan Horne and received a case of wine for doing so!

Jonathan Horne Antiques, A Collection of Early English Pottery, Part VII, no. 184

The Stanley Goldfein Collection

References:

Grigsby 2000
Leslie B. Grigsby, A Passion for Pottery, Further Selections From The Henry H. Weldon Collection, (Sotheby’s Publications, 2000)

Horne 2003
Exhibition. Jonathan Horne, English Pottery and related works of art, 2023

Ströber 2002
Eva Ströber, Ostasiatika, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museums Braunschweig, (2002)

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[i] See Ströber 2002 for the many examples in the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum Braunschweig.

[ii] Ströber 2002, no. 347.

[iii] Grigsby 2000, no. 210.

SOLD