The Unsurpassed Work of Silversmith Paul Storr

George, the third silvergilt honeypot and stand in the form of the bee by Paul store, London 1798

During the first half of the 19th century, Paul Storr (1770 to 1844) was the most celebrated silversmith in England and his work is unsurpassed.

The George III silver gilt honeypot and stand you see here is by Paul Storr. Made in the form of a bee skep. It measures just 11.5cm high and is beautifully conceived and modelled. The wreath finial has a plain cartouche but on other Paul Storr honeypots like this one it is often engraved with a crest.

My wife’s grandparents and Uncle Maurice were celebrated beekeepers on the island of Jersey so this object speaks into some precious memories for me.

The history of bee skeps is thought to go back some 2000 years. From the Middle Ages bee skeps were made of straw to keep bees in before the invention of the beehive in 1851. Today skeps are mostly used for collecting swarms of bees.

This naturalistic object is bound up with the Romanticism and ideas of the rural idyll prevalent in the early 19th century which placed an emphasis on our emotional response to the beautiful and sublime which contrasted with the effects of the Industrial Revolution, urbanisation and the rationalism of the Enlightenment.

Detail of the honeypot’s stand showing the maker’s mark for Paul Storr on the underside, London 1798

Alongside the leopards mask of the London assay office, the Lion Passant silver mark and date letter for 1798 is the Paul Storr maker’s mark PS which remained relatively unchanged throughout his career. This honeypot was only made a year before Paul Storr was commissioned to make the ‘Battle of the Nile cup’ for presentation to Lord Nelson in 1799.

Today pieces from Paul Storr’s workshops can be found at the Duke of Wellington’s London home, Apsley House, as well as Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace, Arundel Castle and museums around the world.

In 1807 Paul Storr joined Philip Randall at Randall Bridge and Randall. It was the leading firm of silversmiths in the early 19th century. It held the Royal Warrant from 1806. Working here Paul Storr would produce silver objects for both George III and George IV.

In 1819 he left the firm to regain his artistic freedom producing beautiful naturalistic pieces. In 1822 he partnered with John Mortimer founding Storr and Mortimer in 1822 with retail premises in New Bond Street, London.

Paul Storr’s remarkable talents are still revered by collectors today and the silver-gilt skep honeypot has just sold at Toovey’s for £10,400.

Christmas Charity Fundraiser Celebrates the Work of St John Ambulance

County President Giles York with Cadets and volunteers from St John Ambulance Sussex

A Christmas charity fund raising party, organised by Toovey’s on behalf of St John Ambulance at their Washington auction rooms, raised some £5500 and donations are still being received. Money was being raised for a new community support vehicle to enable the volunteers to provide first aid and welfare at events across Sussex. With some £39,000 now raised they are more than halfway towards their target of £75,000.

The St John Ambulance Cadets were out in force on the night and were celebrated by all who came. Speaking to them on the evening I was reminded how proud these impressive young people are of their association with St John Ambulance and the remarkable first aid training they receive.

Since its beginnings in 1877 the organisation has sought to save lives and support the communities it serves. The St John Ambulance service and the Jerusalem Eye Hospital charities operate under the auspices of the British royal order of chivalry, The Order of St John.

St John Ambulance provides first aid training not only to its volunteers but also to businesses and other organisations. It is humbling to reflect that it is older than the NHS who it works with as well as other healthcare partners. When Covid-19 broke out St John Ambulance worked with the NHS providing care and vaccination support.

St John Ambulance offer healthcare support to the homeless and vulnerably housed communities in Brighton and Hastings through drop-in clinics at static locations and their mobile treatment centres. They also support and celebrate organ donors’ families.

Rupert Toovey conducting the fundraising auction at Toovey’s for St John Ambulance, Sussex

Alongside these more recent developments St John Ambulance continues to be dedicated to the teaching and practice of medical first aid and the provision of ambulance services through volunteer units rooted in their local communities. The ambulances and community support vehicles are fitted out with up to date equipment so that the volunteers can provide care wherever they are and wherever people are in need.

As a former chaplain to St John Ambulance here in Sussex it was my privilege to witness their extraordinary contribution to our communities across the county.

The gifts of service to others is richly apparent in the work of the volunteers and staff at St John Ambulance here in Sussex. There is much to celebrate in their work and they need our support. If you would like to contribute to their much needed community support vehicle go to www.justgiving.com/page/tooveys-forsja-1701168656267.

The Irridescence of Loetz Art Nouveau Glass

A pair of Loetz Crete Pampas design glass vases, circa 1900, from the collection of John and Poppy Stallebrass

A fine collection of Loetz glassware from the collection of the connoisseurs and glass dealers, John and Poppy Stallebrass, is to sold in Toovey’s specialist auction of glass on Wednesday 6th December 2023.

In the early 20th century Art Nouveau became highly fashionable amongst glass makers and designers including the German manufacturer Loetz.

It was the great American innovator and glass designer Louis Comfort Tiffany who first gave expression to Art Nouveau in iridescent glass. His work would be widely copied in America and Europe.

Demand for iridescent glass was particularly high in Germany and Loetz called some of its early iridescent ware ‘gläser à la Tiffany’. Max Ritter von Spaun headed Loetz during the Art Nouveau period, The grandson of the company founder Johann Loetz, von Spaun became artistic director in 1879. Whilst he acknowledged his debt to Tiffany his approach differed as he sought to produce artistic pieces which were affordable to all.

All Loetz glass is of the highest quality despite being produced in relatively high quantities. Its decoration is rarely representational depending instead on complex technical formulas to create the abstract designs. Wonderful colour combinations with intense blues and greens are heightened with silver and gold iridescence as can be seen in the pair of small green Loetz Crete Pampas design vases of conical form which are estimated at £250-350. Just 14.5cm high their decoration is extraordinary. The Pampas is a common Loetz design. The name probably derives from pampas grass from the sweet grass family Poaceae.

A Loetz Candia Diaspora golden iridescent glass vase, circa 1902, from the collection of John and Poppy Stallebrass

Candia Diaspora refers to the textured design on the small blue and golden Loetz iridescent glass vase. It is also part of the John and Poppy Stallebrass collection. Measuring 12.5cm it is estimated at £70-£100. It dates from around 1902 but there is something distinctly contemporary in its waisted shape, iridescence and erupted crater like surface.

Most Loetz pieces of glass are unsigned. The intensity of colour and silky surface was unmatched by any other European glass maker. In many regards Loetz is comparable with Tiffany and yet the prices for its glass, for now, remain much more accessible.

Compared to so many collectors fields glass represents exceptional value with pieces by many leading designers and makers still really affordable. Pre-sale estimates for pieces in Toovey’s 250 lot specialist glass sale on Wednesday 6th December 2023 range from £50-£1000 and the catalogue is online at www.tooveys.com.

Life, Light and Colour Painted by Dorothea Sharp

Dorothea Sharp, oil on canvas, The Bath

Dorothea Sharp (1874-1955) painted joyful still lifes and landscapes, often with children on the beaches of Cornwall where she lived for much of her life near St. Ives.

The artist was born into a prosperous Quaker family in Dartford, Kent in 1874. The eldest of five children she was twenty-one before she began to study painting at the art school run by C.E. Johnson in Richmond. She would later attend the Regent Street Polytechnic where she was influenced by visiting tutor, the English Realist and Impressionist painter, Sir George Clausen.

Soon after the untimely death of her father in 1900 Dorothea moved to Paris.

The hope filled scene painted by Dorothea Sharp titled ‘The Bath’ sold at Toovey’s for £8000. The price reflects her reputation as a painter and the ever growing interest in women artists amongst collectors.

Dorothea Sharp’s paintings were influenced by her time in Paris and exposure to the Impressionists including Claude Monet. Best known for her landscapes, which often include children, Dorothea Sharp’s style is spontaneous and impressionistic. ‘The Bath’ depicts a hope filled, joyful, sunlit interior as a mother bathes her baby. Through the window a sailing boat enters the estuary the blue of the sea brilliant against the grey green hills of the far shore.

Dorothea Sharp often painted her subjects looking into the light which lends her subjects a luminosity. The love of a mother for her child is brilliantly captured here by the artist’s confident palette, wonderful sense of light and spontaneous brush strokes.

Dorothea Sharp, oil on canvas, Still Life with Summer Flowers

Her confidence and ability is also apparent in the Still Life with a Vase filled with Summer Flowers which was also sold at Toovey’s for £9000. The scene is once again gifted with such life by the play of light expressed in the palette and brush work.

Dorothea Sharp was part of that remarkable group of influential women artists in the early 20th century which included Laura Knight, Dod Procter, Wilhelmina Barns-Graham and Winifred Nicholson.

She exhibited at the Royal Academy, was elected to the Royal Society of British Artists in 1907, the Royal Institute of Oil Painters in 1922, and was also President of the Society of Women Artists over a period of four years. But, it was not until 1933 that Dorothea Sharp held her first one woman show at the James Connell & Sons Gallery in London. It was a huge success.

Today this gifted 20th century woman artist’s work continues to be celebrated and collected.

China’s Colourful Porcelain

A Chinese Yongzheng period (1722-1735) famille rose export porcelain tea service, finely enamelled with panels of a lady and boy seated in an interior

The reign of the Kangxi Emperor saw a renewal in the manufacture and decoration of porcelain with a huge shift from the five colour schemes of earlier wares to more colourful enamels and new designs.

The emperor Kangxi’s reign (1661-1722) was the longest in Chinese history. He re-established the imperial porcelain factory at Jingdezhen. Foreign trade with Britain and Europe reached new heights.

Three dimensional porcelain objects were transformed with narrative compositions of exceptional quality and complexity which reveal themselves as the piece is turned. The tradition of the gradual unwinding of the hand scroll was transposed onto porcelain where the stories were depicted in vibrant colourful enamels or underglaze blue.

Famille verte is identified by its vivid green overglaze enamels often combined with other polychrome enamels.

The repaired Kangxi period famille verte rouleau vase was sold at Toovey’s for £13,000 and is a typical example. The body is finely painted with a continuous narrative scene of figures in and outside a pavilion complex beside a river, rocks and trees.

A Chinese Kangxi period (1661-1722) famille verte porcelain rouleau vase, the body finely painted with a continuous narrative scene

It was during the Kangxi period that figures became central to the decoration of porcelain marking a significant aesthetic change. The narrative compositions are often hierarchical leading the viewer’s eyes to the central characters. But this artistry and attention to detail informs every aspect of the decorative scheme. Even the minor figures and details are beautifully depicted.

Eggshell porcelain is an extraordinarily thin pure-white Chinese porcelain of very fine quality. Eggshell porcelain called t’o-t’ai in Chinese, meaning bodiless, was first made in the early Ming Dynasty, probably during the reign of the Yongle Emperor (1403-1424).

The later Chinese eggshell porcelain famille rose tea service dates from the reign of the Yongzheng Emperor (1722-1735) and realised £18,000 at Toovey’s. Each piece is finely enamelled with panels depicting a lady and boy seated in an interior with a female attendant and furniture, reserved against a blue cell diaper ground incorporating butterflies and flowers.

Chinese famille rose porcelain is characterised by the decorative use of pink overglaze enamels. It would reach its heights in the 18th century and was predominately made at Jingdezhen remaining popular into the 19th century.

China’s colourful porcelain delighted British and European connoisseurs in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. Today this porcelain is still celebrated by international collectors from China and across the world, and prices remain strong.