Possibly by Gironimo Tomasi, perhaps workshop of Guido Dirantino, arms of Scheuffelin

Joseph Chompret Collection (1869 - 1956);

Hôtel Drouot, Chayette-Cheval, Paris, 19 October 2011, lot 54;

Rainer Zietz, London;

Where acquired, in November 2011.

T. Wilson, Italian Maiolica and Europe, Oxford, 2017, no. 78 p. 190-192.

The subjects of the Scheuffelin service are historical, biblical and mythological and only five plates are known today that belonged to the Scheuffelin family, the and the majority of which remain in Germany. These extant pieces are listed in T. Wilson in Italian Maiolica and Europe, op.cit., pp.191-192, the dish presented here is identified in note 6. . 

The attribution to Gironimo Tomasi (or di Tommaso), proposed by Justin Raccanello and Camille Leprince, adds an element of rarity to this plate. Tomasi was an important and accomplished Urbino istoriato painter who, it has been argued, played a key role in the workshop of Guido Durantino (Fontana) during the 1550s and 1560s. However, his career had an impact on the history of European maiolica as a whole becauses he left Urbino in 1575-76 and executed a tiled altarpiece at Albisola, in Liguria, signed and dated 1576. Tomasi moved to Lyon in 1581 where he played a crucial role in the introduction of Italian style istoriato-painting to France in the form of faience.

Tomasi was also responsible for the earliest surviving marked piece of French istoriato made in Lyon, dated 1582 (see D. Thornton and T. Wilson in Italian Renaissance Ceramics: a catalogue of the British Museum Collection, London 2009, Vol II, no. 341. pp. 546-548)

The similarity in the painting style and in the colour palette seem to indicate that this plate may have been by the same hand as the painter of a dish in the Ashmolean Museum Oxford, (see T. Wilson 2017, op.cit., n° 78 p. 190-192) (fig.1).

RELATED LITERATURE

T. Thornton, T. Wilson, Italian Renaissance Ceramics: a catalogue of the British Museum Collection, London, 2009, Vol II, n° 341. pp. 546-548.