Holy Family under Palm Tree
Hausmaler Jug Abraham Helmhack
Faience: Hanau (attributed)
Decoration: Blue painting with a little schwarzłot Abraham Helmhack (signed),
Nuremberg, ca. 1680/90 H. 19.8 cm (with mounts: 23.4 cm)
Pear-shaped body, cylindrical neck, grey-white glaze. Light blue muffle-fired decoration, some leaves in schwarzlot. Roundel with the Holy Family resting on the Flight to Egypt (Matthew 2, 13-15). Mary with the child in her arms is resting in the shade of a palm tree; behind her stands Joseph leaning on a rock, the donkey to the left. In the back- ground, a wide hilly landscape. An angel’s head above the palm tree. Frame of acanthus branches and German flowers. Under the picture where the branches intersect, baroque bow and the signature AH in monogram form. Silver-gilt mounts of Breslau, year letter for 1712-1721, Master’s mark GI, Gottfried Ihme, Master 1691, d. 1737 (Rosenberg 1378, 1435).
On top of the lid, silver commemorative medal of 1630 for the centenary of the Confessio Augustana with the portraits of the Saxon electors, Johann the Steady (1525-1532) and Johann Georg I (1611-1656).
Abraham Helmhack
Copper Engraver and glass painter in Nuremberg
Abraham Helmhack (1654 – 1724)
a contemporary copper engraving portrait of himself shows him with a glass in one hand and a paintbrush in the other
Hausmaler
HAUSMALEREI, or STUDIO PAINTING, dates from the end of the Thirty-Years-War (1648).
This faience decoration, originally a subsidiary occupation not subject to the rules and regulations of the guilds, was first practiced about 166o in Nuremberg, the free imperial city, which was ruled by a patriciate of merchants and landowners.
Johann Schaper was the first to master the technique of mufflefired painting, at first in schwarzlot (shades of black or brown), gold or purple and later in other hues as well. He was followed in about 1680 by the glass painters, Abraham Helmhack and Johann Ludwig Faber, and the goldsmiths Wolfgang Rössler and Johann Heel.
Hausmaler never fashioned ceramic ware themselves, but painted the undecorated pieces, which they acquired from factories in Delft,Hanau, Frankfurt and elsewhere (after 1712 from Nuremberg as well), in their own particular technique of schwarzlot or colored enamel.
Bosch, Helmut: Deutsche Fayencekrüge des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts p. 18 ff
Museum reference V+ A London:
Victoria and Albert Museum London
Earthenware covered with a tin glaze and painted in manganese with a Bacchanalia scene. Jug probably made in Hanau and painted by Abraham Helmhack in Nuremberg. about 1690
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O161768/jug-helmhack-abraham
Museum reference Metropolitan Museum N.Y.
Metropolitan Museum New York
Flagon ca. 1690
Decorator: Abraham Helmhack (1654–1724)
Mount maker: Christopher Marx (working 1687–1731)
German, Hanau with Nuremberg decoration
Tin-glazed earthenware; pewter mounts
Dimensions: H. 10-1/4 in. (26.0 cm)
Signature: Signed at bottom and outside of frame: A H (decorator’s mark for Abraham Helmhack)Marking: Inside pewter cover: eagle displayed, dimidiated by two bends, .C on upper bend, M. on lower bend (mark for Christopher Marx)
Literature
Bosch, Helmut: Deutsche Fayencekrüge des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts. Sammlungen Hans Cohn, Los Angeles. Siegfried Kramarsky, New York.
Mainz: Von Zabern 1983.
