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06 Jun 2006 / 0 Comment

English Silver At The Court Of The Tsars

Published: June 6, 2006

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The Russian Kremlin evokes many mental images, but for Western minds, ornately decorated silver flagons, tankards and salt cellars – the tableware of Tudor England – are not usually high on the list. Yet the Armory Museum in the Kremlin houses one of the largest and most impressive collections of English silver in the world, spanning the eras of the Sixteenth Century Elizabethan period to the Restoration.

It is not that early English silver is so plentiful in Russia, but that it is so scarce everyplace else. Cumulatively, there is a plethora of important pieces that document English silver production throughout the vast network of British museums; however, to see what is often regarded as the single most important collection, one would usually have to travel to Moscow.

“Britannia & Muscovy, English Silver at the Court of the Tsars,” an exhibition featuring many of the most important pieces from the Kremlin collection, together with a selection of related books and maps, offers American audiences a rare opportunity to view the collection. It currently is on display at the Yale Center for British Art through September 10.

The Russianmade kovsh was used for serving mead This model 1624 belonged to the tsar Courtesy of the Moscow Kremlin Museum

The Russian-made kovsh was used for serving mead. This model, 1624, belonged to the tsar. Courtesy of the Moscow Kremlin Museum.

The legend of the Kremlin collection of English silver datesback to the Nineteenth Century, when museum curators in Englandwere first tipped off by some diplomats. Rumors of this great cacheof early English silverwork were abundant, most often boasting ofpieces of the utmost quality. A pioneering study conducted shortlybefore the 1917 Revolution confirmed the rumors and raised the hopethat the collection would become better known, but it was followedby decades of silence.

For 50 years, the English silver specialists were in one part of the world and the English silver in another. It was not until the early 1960s that a scholar with access to English research would again study the Kremlin’s collection. “Britannia & Muscovy” builds on the work of the past 40 years.

The story behind how so much English silver came to be deposited in the Kremlin Armory is connected to Russia’s long efforts to establish itself as a European power. Cultural gatherings and diplomatic embassies were important events for a ruler and his court. There were banquets and entertainment and, of course, gift exchanges.

This Elizabethan salt cellar 159495 is more than twice the size of the typical model Courtesy of the Moscow Kremlin Museum

This Elizabethan salt cellar, 1594-95, is more than twice the size of the typical model. Courtesy of the Moscow Kremlin Museum.

Relations between England and Russia date back to themid-Sixteenth Century when a private trading company wasestablished by London merchants for the discovery of the East. Inthose days, opening up markets was synonymous with exploration. Onthe first mission in 1553, two ships sank, but the third reachednot China or the East Indies but the Russian port of Archangel, tothe south of the Arctic Circle.

The ship’s captain, Richard Chancellor, visited the court of Ivan IV, the grand duke of Muscovy, who had established himself as the most powerful Russian prince. Ivan the Terrible, as he became known, the first of the Russian royalty to call himself tsar, wanted to strengthen Muscovy’s ties with Western rulers, so he granted the English favorable trade conditions.

Diplomatic missions soon followed. Beginning in 1568, the English government dispatched ambassadors laden with sumptuous gifts – bribes, in fact – to preserve the privileges of English merchants. Crystal vessels and fine textiles, even a state coach, were among the offerings. Silverwork also figured prominently in the embassy inventories.

The silver presented in the exhibition is typical of Sixteenth Century English wares, gilded and heavily embellished and displaying the technical brilliance for which the London smiths were known. Not safeguarded by preservationists, many of the pieces were melted down throughout the centuries as styles and tastes changed – and financial necessity dictated. Vast quantities of silver were also melted down during the unrest of the English Civil War beginning in 1642.

The Russians, by contrast, were more protective of the treasures they received, and for centuries these foreign wares were exhibited on state occasions as proof of Russia’s close ties with the West. The objects comprising the collection of the Kremlin have been described by scholars as “exceedingly rare and historically significant.”

Centaur, attributed to A.L. Jewell & Co. (working 1852-67), Waltham, Mass. Electra Havemeyer Webb purchased the 38-inch-long sculpture from Edith Halpert in 1950.

“Silhouettes in The Sky” begins in the museum’s lipstick red1901 Round Barn, moved to its present site from East Passumpsic,Vt., in 1985-86, and concludes in the Stagecoach Inn, built inCharlotte, Vt., in 1783 and moved in 1949. Redesigned in 2002, thegalleries of the Stagecoach Inn, in addition to weathervanes, housecigar store figures, trade signs, ship’s carvings and folkpainting. Having the weathervanes evenly divided between the twolocations gets visitors to different ends of the museum campus,said the curator.

“The Round Barn is the first point of contact for visitors to Shelburne. It’s great architecture, but a problematic exhibition environment,” said Burks. “Our conservation department won’t let us put anything in it that is sensitive to humidity and temperature. Ceramics and glass are safe, but their scale isn’t right. One thing that immediately comes to mind as suitable for this space are weathervanes. We probably have the largest collection in the country.”

Burks grouped the weathervanes, mostly of New England origin, under the headings “Barnyard Beasts,” “Equestrian Enthusiasm,” “Fancy Forms,” “Ocean Occupants,” “Freedom Figures,” “American Indian Images,” “Mythological Monsters” and “Modern Miracles.”

“Pisces,” a painted weathervane of two sheet-iron fish that swim in opposite directions, late Nineteenth Century. Courtesy Shelburne Museum.

There are many old favorites: among them a 54-inch-long woodmermaid, carved by Warren Gould Ruby, who holds a wooden comb andgazes at herself in an attached metal mirror; two sheet-iron fishwho swim in opposite directions; and “To, Te,” a painted sheet-ironfigure of an Indian depicted in a semiabstract profile reminiscentof Picasso’s almond-eyed sirens. The syllables “To, Te” appear insilhouette along the banner on which the Indian, bow and arrow inhand, kneels. “To, Te” stands for “totem of the Eagle” and was anemblem of the Improved Order of Redmen, an early Nineteenth Centuryfraternal organization devoted to the principles of Americanliberty.

Burks’ own taste runs to a 7-foot-long copper, brass, zinc and iron fire pumper attributed to J.W. Fiske Company; and a more primitive, sheet zinc, brass and iron locomotive fitted with a sunburst lighting rod.

“I love weathervanes that celebrate American ingenuity,” the curator explained. She added, “I hope that people will have new favorites after visiting the show.”

A recent addition to the collection is a needle-nosed iron swordfish found in Perth Amboy, N.J. The museum purchased it from New Hampshire dealer Jane Workman in 2002.

Warren Gould Roby, a trained coppersmith, carved this unique painted wood weathervane for his house in Wayland, Mass., around 1825-50. The mermaid measures 54 1/2 inches long and holds a metal mirror. Courtesy Shelburne Museum.

Many of the weathervanes illustrated in the slim catalogwritten by Burks and published by the Shelburne Museum are byunknown makers. A few are the work of well-known manufacturers ofthe late Nineteenth Century, among them L.W. Cushing & Sons andCushing & White of Waltham, Mass.; Rochester Iron Works Co. ofRochester, N.H.; Harris & Co. of Boston; as well as J.W. FiskeCompany of New York City.

“Even in a mass-produced weathervane there was a lot of handwork. We want visitors to understand how molded copper weathervanes were made, beginning with carving a pattern from wood; creating a hollow, two-sided iron mold; putting sheet copper inside of the mold; then painting the piece. If you had a sheet-iron tail, that was a separate process,” said Burks, who included patterns and molds in the show.

Of special interest, given Christie’s January sale of a Goddess of Liberty weathervane attributed to William Hennis of Philadelphia for a record $1.08 million, is a 46-inch-tall Goddess of Liberty carved and painted wooden pattern made by Henry Leach for Cushing & White. Webb purchased the pattern from Halpert in 1941.

“It’s massive. People have to see it to appreciate its scale,” exhibition curator Jean Burks says of this 88 3/4-inch-long Fire Pumper, a copper, brass, zinc and iron weathervane attributed to J.W. Fiske Company (working 1873-93) of New York City. The vane is modeled after an Amoskeag engine built between 1840 and 1880. Courtesy Shelburne Museum.

Owning patterns and molds could be useful, as Halpert,director of New York’s Downtown Gallery, knew. Halpert acquiredL.W. Cushing & Sons’ Nineteenth Century components for making”Hindoo,” a stylized racehorse weathervane modeled after the 1881Kentucky Derby winner. In 1955, Halpert presented Webb with areplica, on view in “Silhouettes in The Sky,” of the original.

Encouraged by Halpert to regard weathervanes as art, Webb cared little about the history and provenance of her pieces, a disappointment, perhaps, to visitors interested in documentation. When Webb’s first assistant, now in her 90s, recently visited the museum, she recalled that her former boss did not even like labels on her pictures.

“Webb wanted you to look at the art. She was also a great decorator. I’ve never seen any photographs of weathervanes in her houses, but I have a feeling that she moved them around on a regular basis. It was just her personality,” said Burks.

What Webb loved was color, form and scale. Said the curator, “She especially loved scale, objects that were very small and objects that were large. I think scale is one reason why so many people respond so to weathervanes. Many of these sculptures are huge when you get them down off a building.”

Horse and Jockey, Massachusetts origin, about 1880. Molded copper with a zinc head; 34 by 17 1/2 inches. Courtesy Shelburne Museum.

Electra Webb, said Elizabeth Stillinger, author of aforthcoming book on early collectors of American folk art, “was,along with Henry du Pont and Henry Sleeper, one of the two or threemost visually motivated collectors of her era and one of the mostgifted at making very charming visual arrangements.”

Moving beyond Webb’s aesthetic approach, Burks said, “We wanted to tell the story and put it into context. I wanted to show people that weathervanes were more than a bunch of roosters. They were handmade as well as mass-produced. They were cultural barometers reflecting popular interests of the day.”

“Old Gabriel’s” next stop has yet to be decided.

“‘He can’t can go back on top of White Church. He’s gotten fairly fragile and his value is unbelievable,” Hunsdon said recently by phone.

Noting that the White Church Association has been offered $350,000 to $450,000 for the historic vane since its recovery, she said, “Most of us are sentimental and not that much motivated by the money. We have a nice local museum and would like to have our weathervane here, but, like most museums, we’re small and lack money for the proper security. For the moment, we’re happy to have ‘Old Gabriel’ safe and sound at the Shelburne Museum.”

The Shelburne Museum is on Route 7. For information, 802-985-3346 or www.shelburnemuseum.org.



   

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