Sugar Box

Artist Johann Ludwig Schoap I (German, 1667 - 1741)

Date1732-1733

MediumSilver with mercury gilding

DimensionsOverall: 3 1/4 × 5 3/16 × 4 1/16 inches (8.26 × 13.18 × 10.32 cm)

Credit LineGift of James H. Hyde

Object number50-50

On View

Not on view

Collections

Architecture, Design and Decorative Arts

Terms

DescriptionOval box on scroll feet. Engraved designs and repousse medallions.Gallery Label

Gallery Label

The aristocracy of 18th-century Europe favored an opulent lifestyle enriched with decorative wares in a variety of luxurious materials, including gold, silver and porcelain. Inspired by exoticism, the Meissen Pagod with a parrot perched on her arm is a European interpretation of a female version of the Asian god of happiness. Not simply decorative, the pagod's open mouth allowed incense aromas to escape from her hollow form. Bringing refinement to the table and, like the pagod and Boy Masquerading as a Sultan, reflecting the European fascination with foreign cultures, the Meissen Cream Pot is ornately decorated with gilded, exotic scenes including palm trees and monkeys. The gilded Sugar Box, produced in Augsburg, an 18th-century goldsmithing center, may have been part of a fashionable, elaborate traveling service.

Provenance

James Hazen Hyde (1876-1959), New York, possibly after 1941-by June 23, 1950 [1];

His gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1950.

NOTES:

[1] James Hazen Hyde was a collector and head of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States. He donated this box to the Nelson-Atkins following a visit to Kansas City as part of a decade-long personal study of American art and cultural centers. He donated a card inventory of his collection to the Bibliotheque des Arts Decoratifs in Paris in 1941. The inventory does not include a card for this object, however, so Hyde may have acquired it after that date. Hyde first mentioned this object in a letter to Paul Gardner, Director, June 23, 1950, Nelson-Atkins Registration files. According to “A Gift of an Old Silver Box is Made to Nelson Gallery,” The Kansas City Star, November 17, 1950, 27, “The box is one of many art objects Hyde collected in his thirty-six years abroad.”

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