Equestrian Portrait of Friedrich August II the Strong

Königlich Sächsische Porzellan-Manufaktur, Meissen, Germany,

based on a model by Johann Joachim Kändler, ca. late 19th century

Glazed, painted and gilt white porcelain, restored.

H: 67 cm, including pedestal

UMP 7724

The porcelain statue copies the statue in Dresden of Augustus II, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, which was designed by sculptor Jean Joseph Vinache (1696–1754), including the coat of arms and inscriptions on the pedestal with the date the monument was unveiled (1736). The monument was commissioned by Augustus the Strong (1670–1733), cast in bronze and completed after the death of the sovereign. Inspired

by a statue of Roman Caesar Augustus of Prima Porta, the “Golden Rider” presents a rider in Classical armour on a rearing horse, a lion’s hide serving as the saddle. In 1734, Meissen-based sculptor and modeller Johann Joachim Kändler considered making a porcelain statue in the style of Vinache’s monument. Kändler’s heroic statue featuring

many additional allegoric figures would be a variation on the equestrian monument and honour the new king, Augustus III, the son and successor of Augustus the Strong. Kändler was still working on the porcelain statue through the 1750s and was prevented from continuing his work by the Seven Years' War, which was waged until 1762, and the monarch’s ensuing death in 1763.

Similar porcelain portraits of the Elector of Saxony as a rider in Roman armour, standing on various types of pedestals, are in the repositories of a number of other museums and in private collections. The equestrian statue might have been cast from Kändler’s original form for the monument dating from 1753 or from a copy of the form, but in general terms it is a porcelain sculpture created in the second half of the 19th century or in the early 20th century. It appeared in the Pilsen collection in 1909, when museum director Škorpil purchased the already slightly damaged statue on the Prague art market for 4,000 Austro-Hungarian gulden. It was housed in the museum’s permanent exhibition in 1913. (lmp)