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Red Fine Stoneware panther designer: Erich Oehrne design year: 1939 manufacturer: the Staatliche Porzellan-Manufaktur Meissen, Germany materials: red fine stoneware notes: Johann Friedrich Böttger (1682-1719) worked as an alchemist for King Augustus of Poland after he fled from the King of Prussia, who attempted to seize Böttger, believing that he had mastered the secret of the “Philosopher’s Stone”. Augustus of Poland put him to work immediately searching for the same impossible task of making gold from base metals. The task ended in failure, naturally. The court scientist to King Augustus, Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus (1651-1708), suggested to the King that Böttger’s services might better serve the monarchy if he were to turn his attentions to the creation of earthenware that would fill the King’s treasury with profit resulting from industrial production. The King agreed, and both Böttger and von Tschirnhaus began experimenting with clays and earths between 1708 and 1710. As a result, they succeeded in producing red stoneware that was so hard it could be polished on the lapidary’s wheel. Böttger wanted to make a “hard-paste” white porcelain, simliar to the porecelain the Chinese had been producing since 613 CE, instead of merely imitating and refining earthenware, as he had been doing with his experiments in red stoneware. Around 1710, he found the proper balance of materials to mix into what was to be the first true European white porcelain with a smooth texture and translucent quality, and the Meissen manfuactory was established. A resurgence of interest in red stoneware began in the early 20th century. Max Adolf Pfeiffer, who was Meissen’s director from 1918 until 1933, reintroduced pieces executed in this unusual and challenging material into the collection. dimensions: 12" x 15" price: $3,200.00