Kolekcja | 24.09.2015 This small likeness of an infant in swaddling clothes is not a child’s toy. Such elongated objects were made out of ivory, silver, glass and, predominantly, porcelain embellished with meticulously painted colourful decorations. Outfitted with a silver or sometimes a gold setting with curlicues, they fulfilled the function of a sophisticated case for small utensils indispensable for the elegant ladies of the period. As a rule, they were used for carrying needles or hairpins, and sometimes served as a cover for a small penknife or pencil.
Needlecases in the shape of an infant or asparagus are mentioned among the wide assortment of small articles in a document issued by the Meissen manufactory in 1765. Other items from potteries in Germany, France or England assumed the refined shape of a girl’s leg in a shoe and wearing a stocking and a garter, or a woman’s arm with a visible fragment of a sleeve and cuff, a bracelet and rings, with the hand often holding a cluster of grapes, a handkerchief or a miniature bouquet of flowers.
Barbara Szelegejd