CHAPTER II

FRANTZ HEINRICH MÜLLER
(1773-1801)

QUEEN JULIANE MARIE PERIOD
PART I (1775-1780)

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CHRONOLOGY

1732. Frantz Heinrich Müller born, 17th November.

1765. Müller solicits support for the establishment of a porcelain factory.

1773. Frantz Heinrich Müller presents his first pieces of hard-fired transparent porcelain to Christian VII. The first hard porcelain made in Denmark.

1775. A company formed, of which the members of the Royal Family held shares. The Dowager Queen Juliane Marie suggests the factory mark of the three blue lines, symbolizing the three waterways of Denmark, which mark was adopted and has been continuously used since that date.

1779. The factory taken over by the king becomes the Royal Porcelain Manufactory.

1780. The first retail depot opened in Copenhagen.

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CHAPTER II

FRANTZ HEINRICH MÜLLER
(1773-1801)

QUEEN JULIANE MARIE PERIOD
Part I (1775-1780)

The Court of the young king Christian VII—A great Court scandal—A Coup d'Etat—The inception of the Porcelain Factory—The origin of the mark of the Three Blue Lines—Müller's technique—Müller's range of subjects.

At the death of King Frederik V, in January 1766, and the succession of Christian VII, then seventeen years of age, the royal china factory at the Blue Tower fell upon evil days. When Frantz Heinrich Müller, "only after numerous unsuccessful attempts," presented his first three pieces of hard-fired transparent porcelain to the young king in September 1773, there were matters of much graver moment occupying public attention. It was almost in vain that Müller had built new kilns differing from those in which soft porcelain was made, travelled to Bornholm to find suitable clay, and experimented with glazes.

In the six years since the death of Frederik, Denmark had passed through one of the most tragical periods of her history. Christian VII, a manikin prince, became the sport of fate. Caroline Matilda, the sister of George III of England, at the early age of fifteen, became his queen. Himself the son of the beloved Louise, daughter of George II, great hopes were entertained by the Danish people of the alliance. But perverse circumstances—with the grim figure of the Dowager Queen Juliane Marie in the background—beset the path of the young couple.

The Court at Christianborg, an echo of Versailles, filled with painted men and women who affected to despise Danish customs and even the Danish tongue, was a hot-bed of intrigue. Christian threw etiquette to the winds in his sanctum, surrounded by boon companions. The coterie had all the abandon of Sans Souci without the master-mind of Frederick of Prussia and the wit and satire of that monarch's confidantes. Madame de Plessen, lady-in-waiting, stern precisian in etiquette, devoted to her young mistress, but heedlessly tactless, made a breach between the king and queen. The bride of a year retired to the company of staid dowagers and played chess. The petulance and malicious tricks of the king early showed that, unable to govern himself, he was unable to govern others. Madame de Plessen was dismissed by the king and ordered to leave Denmark. Christian's dissipation was rapidly becoming a public scandal. The "Northern Rogue" was the mild epithet of the English populace, who cheered the little king when he came to St. James's. Echoes of his wild life reached Matilda at Copenhagen.

A Great Court Scandal.—At this juncture a remarkable man, John Frederick Struensee, the king's physician, a German, possessed of extraordinary talents, gradually began to assume control of State affairs. The tragic story is too intricate to refer to here in more than a cursory manner. Queen Matilda's attachment to Struensee is as romantic as that of Mary Queen of Scots for Rizzio. An English author has termed her "A Queen of Tears."[4] It is Madame de Genlis who affirms that "men summon physicians only when they suffer, women when they are merely afflicted with ennui." In six years this man became the most powerful in Denmark. An amazing state of things followed. The envoys of the various Powers became alarmed at the situation. Drastic reforms followed one another in quick succession, inaugurated by Struensee, but promulgated in the king's name. Undoubtedly Struensee had a genius for government had he tempered his reforms with discretion. He was saturated with German philosophy, and based his ethics on Voltaire and the sordid sentiment of Rousseau. "It is the path of the passions that has conducted me to philosophy," writes Jean-Jacques, and Struensee might well have applauded that sentiment. He invented a new office and became "Master of Requests" and virtually Prime Minister. But he offended too many people's interests and became the object of hatred. He galled the old nobility by his despotic power, and the Dowager-Queen Juliane Marie, from her seclusion at Fredensborg, filled the Court with spies. The weak-minded king, now showing signs of mental aberration, signed everything put before him, and the young Queen Matilda was under the domination of Struensee, who openly treated her with disrespect.

In 1771 there was great distress in the country and discontent was growing. Scurrilous letters fell at the feet of Struensee and Matilda on their walks at Hirscholm, and placards of a threatening nature were affixed to the walls of the royal palaces. Struensee had flouted the army by attempting to disband the Guards. The mutterings of disaffection became more audible. His effrontery deserted him. He grew craven-hearted in face of grave dangers. His failure stamps him as a colossal adventurer at bottom; had he been of sterner stuff he might have become a hero.

A Coup d'Etat.—The hour for striking a blow was at hand, and Queen Juliane Marie and her son Frederik, with a band of conspirators, at a masked ball on the night of January 16, 1772, seized the person of the king, together with Matilda; the latter was hurried off to the fortress of Kronborg, and Struensee and Brandt, his coadjutor, were imprisoned in the citadel at Copenhagen.

The trial and divorce of Matilda and the beheading of Struensee and Brandt is a poignant story. The name of the unfortunate young queen was ordered to be officially omitted from the prayer-book at a time when she surely stood most in need of prayer. Juliane Marie pursued Matilda with vindictiveness, and her malevolence nearly precipitated Denmark in a war with England. It was intended that Matilda should be imprisoned in a remote fortress in Jutland. The British Minister, Sir Robert Murray Keith, informed the Danish Government that unless Queen Matilda was released he would present his letters of recall and war would be declared. The Danish Minister in London wrote in great haste to say that a fleet was fitting out. It was only then that Queen Juliane Marie released her hold of Matilda and allowed her to depart to Celle, in the State of Hanover, where she died in 1775 in her twenty-third year.

Here, then, was the state of affairs when Müller was experimenting with his clays, his glazes, and his colours. In 1771 a hundred and fifty weavers set out on foot from Copenhagen to Hirscholm, in days of panic, to complain that they were starving because the royal silk factory was closed. It was an ill-starred venture to attempt the establishment of a new porcelain factory, but in face of reverses of fortune and undeterred by lack of support, Müller by his immense energy fired into being the great porcelain factory of Copenhagen. To Müller the Dane belongs the honour of founding the little factory which strove to achieve results no less beautiful than Meissen, Berlin, or Sèvres. Begun in a spirit of worthy emulation, the Copenhagen factory shortly began to develop an original and national style, in spite of the fact that it worked in the early days on foreign suggestion and employed foreign artists.

The Inception of the Porcelain Factory.—Frantz Heinrich Müller was born on the 17th of November 1732. When an apprentice, from the age of fifteen, at the Kong Salomon's Pharmacy at Copenhagen, he devoted his leisure to the study of chemistry, botany, mineralogy, and metallurgy. He was appointed as Guardian of the Mint at the Bank of Copenhagen in his twenty-eighth year, and held the post from 1760 to 1767. As early as 1765 he had the object in view of establishing a porcelain factory; together with a painter named Richter we find him soliciting support. In common with his contemporaries he cast eager eyes on foreign porcelain. He wandered for three years on the Continent under an assumed name, and the unravelling of this period of his career would throw much light on his researches.

Müller, on his secret mission in Germany, found that the china factories of Fürstenberg, Meissen, and Berlin were closed to him. But he threw his whole life and energy into his work. He outlived the opposition of the Society of Apothecaries, who objected to a licence being granted him as a druggist and dispenser. But in face of the objection the College of Medicine found the applicant "a very capable, learned, and experienced man, not only in Pharmacy, but also in Chemistry, Assaying, and Natural History." With characteristic energy he passed the pharmaceutical examination at the age of forty-one; already he had shown originality and inventiveness by making several discoveries in colours and in dyeing. But with all his virility he found financial success no easy matter at such a disturbed period. He endeavoured to form a company for the manufacture of Danish porcelain. To his chagrin, only one share was sold.

At the outset there was little promise that his untiring efforts would win the remotest recognition from his countrymen. It seemed imminent that the whole enterprise would have to be abandoned. Happily, Privy Chancellor Holm, the private secretary to the Dowager-Queen Juliane Marie, saw possibilities in the venture. To revive the old factory which Fournier had vacated was an opportunity not to be missed. If it proved a success, it would redound to the credit of the queen and add lustre to the new régime just commenced under the sway of Juliane Marie, with Guldberg as the power behind the throne. Christian VII had simply passed as a signer of documents into the keeping of another set of masters.

Of the shares, most of them in the new factory were held by members of the royal family and one by Müller himself. The directors were Holm; Suhm, the historian; General Eickstedt, one of the conspirators who took a leading part in the arrest at the masked ball; and Guldberg, who had a finger in every pie. On the 13th of March 1775 the company obtained the monopoly of the manufacture of porcelain in all the dominions of the King of Denmark, in spite of the opposition of the Board of Trade.

The Origin of the Mark of the Three Blue Lines.—The first meeting of the company was held on the 1st of May 1775. It was decided that the trade-mark of the factory, according to the proposal of Queen Juliane Marie, should be three wavy lines, always marked in blue, representing Denmark's three waterways—Oresund, and the two belts: Storebelt, between Sjaelland and Fyen; Lillebelt, between Fyen and Jutland. With this trade-mark of the three blue lines the Copenhagen factory (Den Danske Porcellænsfabrik) took its place beside the older factories on the Continent, and to this day, a hundred and forty-three years afterwards, this same mark appears on all porcelain emanating from the Royal Copenhagen Factory.

Although Müller only had one share of the subscribed capital, there was only one controlling brain. He worked the enterprise single-handedly. It was "par ses seules lumières," to quote a contemporary French account of the factory, that he had succeeded in producing the beautiful porcelain which won early recognition from connoisseurs. But the Court were not eager to encourage ambition. After the late startling exhibition of a now defunct medico, whose head still stuck on a pole on Gallows Hill, genius must needs be rigorously safeguarded. In common, therefore, with his artisans, Müller was required to sign a contract binding him to remain in the employ of the Court factory, and to keep secret all that he knew of the manufacture of porcelain—his own invention. His official position was only that of works manager.

Genius, that indomitable and unquenchable spirit which overrides all obstacles, found Müller, with his crowd of untried soldier workmen and crude apprentices, ceaselessly working in the factory from five in the morning till seven in the evening, and often superintending the firing all night. In 1776 three workmen were inveigled from Meissen to the Court factory at Copenhagen, but only two out of the three showed any ability. Their supercilious manners, together with their higher wages, brought trouble in the factory among the other workmen, and Müller expelled them by force. But he made one appointment which undoubtedly was of benefit to the factory; by contributing part of the salary himself, he brought A. C. Luplau from the Fürstenberg factory, who became modelling master. As early as 1776 the name of Baÿer appears as a painter in colours, as opposed to the painters in underglaze blue. It was Baÿer who afterwards was entrusted with the painting of the celebrated Flora Danica service, begun in 1790. Others whose names are found in the early records are Hans Clio and the portrait painters, Camrath and Ondrup.

The first four years of the factory were very critical. Notwithstanding the close application of Müller, the financial position came to a serious crisis in 1779. There seemed every likelihood that the factory would follow in the steps of Fournier and close its doors. How the royal shareholders adjusted matters is not known, nor what became of Müller's one share in the enterprise. The debts were paid in the king's name, and the factory was taken over by the State and became the Royal Porcelain Manufactory (Den Kongelige Porcellænsfabrik), which name it bears at the present day. In March 1780 a retail business was opened at Copenhagen in connection with the factory. Müller was made inspector of the factory and the title of Councillor of Justice was conferred upon him.

Dated specimens have an exceptional interest in proving that no inconsiderable progress had at that time been made in the artistic development of the factory. Already in form and in decoration there was something distinctive in Müller's ware. Such pieces show indisputably that great days were at hand, if indeed in these first few years success had not already been achieved in training artists and craftsmen in the new industry.

Müller's Technique.—Danish ceramic art is profoundly indebted to Müller for his pioneer work. He was a giant in days when pigmies controlled the destinies. His unflagging energy, his practical experiments, and his original and inventive genius impelled him to implant national characteristics in the Royal Copenhagen porcelain which have never departed from the ware of this factory. His first attempts were made with kaolin which he obtained from the island of Bornholm. He soon realized that this did not fulfil all the conditions necessary for a fine body. It was of a greyish-blue tint, and was liable to lose its shape in firing. In appearance it is not very transparent and is somewhat coarse, like some of the old Japanese porcelain. Of this Bornholm period mention will be made later in dealing with the early examples of blue underglaze painted ware, which is a special variety by itself, running concurrently with the overglaze painted ware which Müller brought in his best period to unexampled perfection.

He prepared the glazes himself, determined the correct method of firing, and made the colours used at the factory. The blue that he invented is perfect, and is to be found on the early specimens of underglaze painted porcelain for domestic use. The green and the purple found in the early Müller period were his own discovery and of exceptional quality in tone. He was a master of technique, and perfected a new body which he called "virgin paste." This is of a dazzling white, and Müller's glaze is transparent and smooth as polished crystal. The tint is that of the green of the sea, and without doubt its technical excellence lends great beauty to the porcelain of this period. Considering the primitive methods of working and the impure materials then available, the perfection and beauty of the results claim profound admiration from the connoisseur. Even with the aid of modern technology and chemistry it has not yet been found possible to equal the technique of Müller's best period.

The year 1780, the date when the first opening of the retail business took place, was the turning-point in the history of the factory. Müller was acclaimed as a genius by his countrymen. It was proposed that a statue should be erected to his honour—and this in his lifetime. A wave of enthusiasm found an outlet in Latin poems to "the man who had done so much for his king and country." It is exceptional to find such contemporary honour bestowed on a potter. Rarely is a man a prophet in his own country. But happily Müller lived to wear the laurel wreath. "What honour," writes a contemporary, "this industry has brought its founder! I was enraptured with the things which I saw. How could I have dreamed that these could be made by a Dane and in my native land!"

We catch an insight into Müller's methods from a letter he wrote, when eighty years of age, to Boye, a subsequent director, who had suggested the use of some pieces of new apparatus for the laboratory. Old Müller wrote as follows: "I fail to see the use or necessity of the thermometer, eudiometer, or hydrometer. I have never found it necessary to apply such exact learning in the manufacture of porcelain, and ideas such as these appear to me to be absolutely absurd." While allowance must be made for Müller's advanced age and his hypersensitiveness towards his successors, it is of great interest to speculate upon his point of view. Man of science that he was, his deprecatory regard for these instruments seems to denote that his technique was arrived at by practical rule-of-thumb methods, dependent upon personal exactitude rather than upon formulæ. It is idle to scoff at Müller's conservatism, for science has yet to unravel the secret of the lost art of tempering the Damascene blade and the subtleties of the potter's art of the K'ang Hsi period in the single coloured glazes, la qualité maîtresse de la céramique, the delicacies of the rare peau de pêche, the famille rose, and the famille verte. In the late seventeenth and early eighteenth-century days the methods of Chinese potters were as unscientific as those defended by Müller, but the results are "not of an age, but for all time." And Müller's results stand the test of intense criticism; they are hitherto inimitable.

Müller's Range of Subjects.—In regard to the periods of the various styles of Müller, with very few data to guide the critic it must be largely a matter of conjecture as to the exact chronological order of their manufacture. It seems to the present writer, in endeavouring to classify the examples, that they naturally fall under the following heads. One class overlaps another in point of time, and although at first, in the experimental period, elaborate artistic creations cannot at that stage have been attempted, it must equally follow that in the middle and later period the simpler and utilitarian forms were still being made concurrently with the finer works of art.

The natural order of development in point of technique would be:—

1. Underglaze painted "mussel" blue-and-white fluted porcelain (pp. 161, 163, 167).
2. Early examples painted in colours overglaze. (See illustrations, pp. 65, 89.)
   • (a) Dishes, plates, tea and coffee services.
   • (b) Vases and ornamental pieces of a minor character.
3. Vases with modelled figures. Figure subjects in colours.
4. Busts, in biscuit.
5. Elaborate and finely modelled vases and sumptuous services, of which the Flora Danica is the culmination.

It is obvious that in the immature years of a pottery figure subjects would be rarely attempted until such time as the potters were sure of their ground and the technique had been securely established. The highest artistic achievements must necessarily come after the rudiments of the art have been mastered. In regard to figure subjects, the fact that Luplau came to Copenhagen in 1776 with eighteen years' experience from the Fürstenberg factory must be taken into consideration in regard to the appearance, at an earlier stage than usual in the history of a factory, of figures of excellent character. But at the same time it must be borne in mind that the utilitarian blue-and-white services, the national Danish pattern now so well known, were made simultaneously with such fine creations as the elaborate royal services at Rosenborg Castle and elsewhere.

All through the periods from Müller onwards the famous blue-and-white has remained as a standard output; but as a rough generalization, with the reservation admitted in regard to figures, it may be said that the classes above mentioned followed one another in quick succession, until the climax of the Müller period was reached, when the Royal Copenhagen Factory worthily claimed a place beside the great factories in Europe.

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CHAPTER III

FRANTZ HEINRICH MÜLLER
(1773-1801) continued

QUEEN JULIANE MARIE PERIOD
PART II (1780-1796)

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CHRONOLOGY

1780. The first retail depot opened by the Royal Porcelain Manufactory in Copenhagen. The china becomes national.

1784. Queen Juliane Marie and her son Frederik, the Hereditary Prince, overthrown.

The Crown Prince Frederik undertakes the government of the country on behalf of his imbecile father, Christian VII.

1790. The importation of foreign porcelain into Denmark prohibited.

The great Flora Danica service for Catherine II, Empress of Russia, commenced.

1796. Queen Juliane Marie dies in retirement.

1801. The battle of Copenhagen.

Müller retires from active work at the factory, then in his sixty-ninth year.

1807. Copenhagen bombarded by the British fleet. Considerable damage done to the Royal Porcelain Factory.

1808. The Crown Prince Frederik ascends the throne as Frederik VI on the death of his father, Christian VII.

The Flora Danica service completed.

1820. Death of Müller. Buried 9th March.

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CHAPTER III

FRANTZ HEINRICH MÜLLER
(1773-1801) continued

QUEEN JULIANE MARIE PERIOD
Part II (1780-1796)

The great outburst of activity in 1780—The manufacture of porcelain an assured success—A contemporary account of the factory—A national style created—The diversity of Müller's designs—National sentiment—Table of marks (1775-1801)—List of leading painters and modellers (1773-1801).

The masterpieces of Müller come, as do all chefs-d'œuvres, as a surprise. Their gracefulness and poetic charm are captivating. To those who have never had the opportunity to examine a fine collection of old Copenhagen porcelain the discovery of these works of art is a revelation. It has hitherto been supposed that the productions of the little Danish factory were only imitative of the works of the older and better-known German factories. But to the most superficial observer it is at once evident that here is something at once national and beautiful.

During the ten years subsequent to the opening of the retail establishment in Copenhagen, the output of the factory must have been very extensive. It is interesting to find that in 1790 the Custom House regulations relative to the subject are as follows: "Foreign china is prohibited, because the manufactory at Copenhagen, which is at the charge of the State, has been of late productive enough to supply the two kingdoms with an article of luxury, more than of necessity. Painted earthenware is likewise prohibited, from its resemblance to china being so great that many may be induced to purchase it instead of a more valuable article; but plain earthenware, being more generally necessary, is allowed, as is also the porcelain brought over by the East India ships belonging to the Asiatic Company."

A Contemporary Account of the Factory.—The testimony of two foreign critics who visited the factory in 1790 is a valuable record, as they produced authoritative statistical volumes on Northern Europe. Their opinion assists the modern student in forming an estimate of the relative value of the Royal Copenhagen porcelain as compared with that of the great contemporary factories, especially Meissen. In Les Voyages de deux François dans le Nord de l'Europe (the Chevalier Louis de Boisgelin and the Comte Alfonse de Fortia), published by the latter, the trade and manufactures of Denmark receive full treatment.

We quote from the English edition, Travels through Denmark and Sweden: to which is prefixed a Journal of a Voyage down the Elbe from Dresden to Hamburgh, including a compendious historical account of the Hanseatic League, by Louis de Boisgelin, Knight of Malta, with views from drawings taken on the spot by Dr. Charles Parry. This was published in two quarto volumes in 1810. The author states that the former volume written by his fellow-traveller is so rare that it is hardly possible to procure a copy "either of the original edition or of the counterfeit one produced in Germany."

The details in regard to the factory as it then existed are very interesting. There were three large and two small ovens; one of these was the first employed by Müller when he produced his hard porcelain. The ovens were of brick. A firing lasted eighteen hours. It took four days to cool. "These ovens are capable of firing eight complete services at once, whereas those of Saxony cannot take in more than three. The fire here is so well distributed that in many of the firings of fine porcelain the loss sustained is scarcely more than ten rix-dollars."

After describing the process of glazing, the writer proceeds to describe the most important operation of all, performed in a room "where there is only one man, who takes an oath to have no communication whatsoever with any other workman. He works a mill by hand in which he prepares the paste, and mixes the different matters which compose the glaze." Of the mills for grinding there were two. The granite came from Zealand; "the black is of no use for this operation, which is not performed in the same manner as in Saxony, where the matter is mixed without water, but here it is quite the contrary. By the method employed in this country there is as much made in two hours as they can possibly produce in Saxony in twenty-four; besides the advantage of having no occasion for sieves."

A contemporary account such as this by competent observers who had visited other porcelain factories in Europe and came with the definite object of finding out as much as possible, is of supreme importance as a document. It appears that the blue which came from Norway was considered the finest. There was an immense loft for "coffins," or cases, to be stored for a year before being ready for use. These were made from Bornholm clay, and were used in the ovens as "saggers," as the term is in English pottery, to contain the porcelain. "The moulds are made of a kind of plaster which comes from France. This," says the narrative, "is the only foreign article employed in the manufactory."

In regard to the overglaze colours used there are some interesting facts. Yellow is made from pure tin; purple, with tin and gold; dark poppy, with iron; sky-blue, with cobalt; black, with manganese; rose-colour, with gold; and green, with copper. "These colours never change in firing, but remain precisely as they were first drawn; whereas they spread in many other factories."

Bearing in mind that the travellers were comparing the manufactures of one country with another in their precise records, which excited European interest in regard to their statistic and economic value, the praise of the Royal Copenhagen porcelain makes the more pleasant reading. "The Copenhagen porcelain is less glassy than that of China. The paste of the biscuit is lighter and closer than that of the Saxon porcelain, the white keeps its colour better, and it is easier to wash. In short, the whole of this manufacture is perfectly well understood, and carried on with great spirit and diligence. It has only been established thirteen years, and at the end of four the storehouses were already filled with a variety of articles. We saw some flutes, for which they asked seventy rix-dollars each. These are very just in tune, but too heavy to be played upon conveniently; they are likewise astonishingly brittle. We were also shown vases two and a half feet high most beautifully painted by Camrath."

The writer makes one extraordinary statement, which goes to show that the finest works were made for rich people, and were not seen by the Danish people in general. "The Copenhagen porcelain is very little known even in Denmark; for the original expenses of a manufacture of this nature are such, that it must necessarily be sold very dear: it is indeed more so at present than the Saxon china; but it is imagined the price will be lowered in a short time."

The number of workmen employed at the factory at the time of this inspection was three hundred, "forty of whom were for the painting part of the business, which we thought but few for that important branch."

In regard to the director, Müller, himself, some trenchant criticisms are made as to the poor recognition the State had given to so great a potter. In other factories there were different directors, one for the body and glaze, another for the ovens and firing, a third for the artistic form, and a fourth for the painting and gilding, all of whom were paid at a high rate. "But here M. Müller, an excellent chemist, acts himself in these various departments, and is very shabbily paid, having only a salary of 500 rix-dollars. He is also the original inventor of this manufacture, and when it is known that he was never out of Copenhagen, and consequently could have had no model to go by, it is inconceivable to what a degree of perfection he has brought it, and that, too, entirely from his own enlightened genius, without the smallest foreign assistance."

Concerning the salary of Müller of 500 rix-dollars per annum, it is noteworthy to observe that at that time the retail price in Copenhagen of a complete afternoon service, consisting of six chocolate cups with handles, twelve coffee cups, coffee-pot, teapot and dish, sugar dish, tea caddy and cream jug, was 19 rix-dollars 3 marks first quality blue-and-white, and 26 rix-dollars 4 marks painted with natural flowers. Müller's yearly labours were evidently reckoned as only worth a score of such afternoon services. Hence the piquant strictures of the foreign noblemen.

The point raised as to Müller not having had the smallest foreign assistance may be dismissed as somewhat erroneous. There was Anton Carl Luplau, who was at the Fürstenberg factory for eighteen years, and who came to Copenhagen in 1776; Johan Christoph Baÿer, who was born in Nuremberg, and came to Copenhagen in 1768, when he was thirty years old; Peter Heinrich Benjamin Lehmann, who was a native of Hamburg, and came to Copenhagen from the Berlin factory in 1780, and was naturalized in 1781; Carl Fridrich Thomaschefsky, who worked a short time at the factory; and Martin Cadewitz, who served eleven years and died in 1791. But in 1781, of two hundred persons employed at the factory only ten were foreigners.

As to whether Müller ever left Copenhagen the Count de Boisgelin adds a footnote: "According to M. Catteau, this was not the fact; we only repeat what the man told us was the case." The work referred to is Le Tableau des Etats Dannois envisagés sous le Rapport du Mécanisme Social, par Jean Pierre Catteau, printed in Paris in 1802 in three volumes.

It is rather an interesting point, but the evidence is against de Boisgelin, for Müller not only visited Brunswick when he entered into negotiations with Luplau to enter the Danish service, but at a slightly earlier date he made a tour of the German factories—in an assumed name, as some accounts go. That he made good use of his time is amply borne out by the results he achieved in so short a space of time on his return to his native land.

There is nothing to detract from the originality and inventiveness of his work. The personality of his genius illuminates the work of the factory. He experienced as many reverses of fortune as did Bernard Palissy, and battled against adverse circumstances with no less indomitable spirit. He conquered technical difficulties, and experimented with clays and bodies and glazes and pigments with hardly less assiduity than did Josiah Wedgwood.

A National Style Created.—No art is wholly independent in origin or of sporadic growth. In the early days and the initial stages it must always be derivative. In ceramic art this applies either to form or decoration, often to both. The form and decoration of Chinese blue-and-white porcelain was the basis of the school of Delft faience. The scale pattern and the panel with exotic birds were slavishly adopted at Sèvres from Oriental prototypes. Similarly the older European factories impressed their styles upon factories of a later growth. The crowd of German factories came under the direct influence of Meissen in design as well as in technique. It is a significant fact that Copenhagen porcelain under Müller's guiding spirit developed an original style from the first establishment of the factory. This achievement should be placed to Müller's credit in determining his position among European potters. He did something more than assimilate the technique of Meissen in his hard paste, and the fact that he was the first man to make real porcelain in Denmark is only a part of the honour due to him. He created what was far more difficult—a national style.

Influences there undoubtedly were bearing on the form and on the style of decoration employed at Copenhagen. Luplau had little technique to learn. He came as a maturely trained modeller from Fürstenberg, which accounts for the fact that busts and statuettes were produced at a much earlier date in the history of the Copenhagen than in a factory having slowly to train its modellers. But undoubtedly a close examination of the porcelain of the Müller period exhibits the fact that there was a fine reticence applied to the form and the decoration which stands out in strong contrast to the extravagances and reckless prodigality of ornament employed by factories with older traditions. The new factory at Copenhagen was endowed with a sense of beauty from the first. The rococo style prevalent then at Meissen and dominating art is seldom found in old Danish porcelain; now and again its presence is noticeable and indicates that the work is of the early experimental days. But Copenhagen created a characteristic and natural style of its own, not only in the choice of Danish or Norwegian subjects, but in its intense love of nature and of simple forms.

The whole series of fine pot-pourri vases with natural flowers in relief is essentially different from Meissen examples where the vase is overloaded with fancifully modelled flowers and leaves. The graceful form and subdued decoration of Copenhagen stand out in effective contrast.

Moreover, the flowers themselves were evidently copied direct from nature, and are executed with such skill and refinement that they still stand as ideals of technical and artistic perfection.

In regard to the modelling of figures, especially those in costume, the reticence of Copenhagen is noticeable in comparison with the outré cavaliers and dames in crinolines of the Saxon and other factories. The subdued colouring and the simple charm of the Danish figures places them in a gallery of their own. Nor must this be mistaken for insipidity or weakness of design. Judged by the highest canons of art, the quality of such creations indicates complete control and mastery of technique, and art in due subjection.

The outburst of strong national intensity, love of nature, breadth of conception, and virility of execution lasted at the most for twenty years. The verse on a plate:—

Enhver sin Sæk til Möllen bærer
Hvor tungt den ham end og besværer:

which may be turned into English:—

Each man to the mill must bear his sack
Although the load may break his back—

was the leading precept of the staff under Müller. All worked together with single-heartedness of purpose, and the result is the admiration of all who love ceramic art, purposeful, and instinct with grace and dignity.

The Diversity of Designs.—The illustrations accompanying this chapter will show the range of subjects executed under the masterly régime of Müller. At first vases and services for royal use were made, but as soon as the retail establishment in 1780 enabled persons outside the royal entourage to purchase the porcelain, the feet of the factory were set on a rock. Similar forms to those embellished with royal ciphers and monograms and portraits were subsequently employed for persons of lesser degree.

The portrait of Müller shows him to have been a keen, virile, determined man, as we know, of endless resources, and possessed of abnormal energy. In less than twenty years there had been a constant and untiring enthusiasm in order to bring the factory to such perfection that it would be able to compete with the older and larger factories of Meissen, Berlin, and Sèvres. Perhaps this object was not achieved, inasmuch as the little factory did not enter into the lists to win European approval, but it succeeded in developing a national style, and this in spite of the fact that at the early stages it worked on foreign suggestion and employed foreign artists. Owing to the crowd of smaller factories at that date assimilating the technique and copying the designs of Meissen, it has come to be erroneously believed, owing to the looseness of generalization by writers on the subject and the absence of detailed study of Copenhagen porcelain of that period, that the Danish factory was another echo of Meissen or Berlin. The contemporary opinion of the two French counts, men of practised skill in observation and keen critics in regard to comparing the state of technique and conditions of manufacture of one country with another, comes as a complete refutation to the belief that Copenhagen was then in the second rank.

In regard to Müller's technical achievements, they stand to this day as a permanent record of his mastery of his art. The new body which he invented and called "virgin paste" is of a clear dazzling white, and is covered with a glaze transparent and smooth as polished crystal, tinted with the green of the sea; this glaze enhanced the beauty of the porcelain. Considering the impure materials then available, and the primitive working methods (for instance, fuel used at that time was wood, in poles 10 feet long of pine and fir), the perfection and beauty of the results demand profound admiration. Even with the aid of modern technology and chemistry it has not yet been found possible at the factory to produce porcelain equal in every respect to the old Müller period.

The diverse character of the output was stupendous. It was rich in design, varied and original in invention, virile in modelling, and national in spirit. The beautiful body invented by Müller had its decoration with his perfected overglaze colours, green and blue and purple. In regard to gilding, the artistic ideal seems to have been attained. It is not possible to convey as illustrations in this volume the extraordinary variety and beauty exhibited in this field. In the cups and saucers herein illustrated, the fine quality of the designs is lost in translation, but these borders of deep blue enriched with gilded designs of the most exquisite character are something to marvel at in connection with the work of the Müller period.

The creations of the factory cover a wide range. The versatility of the modellers and the artists is pronouncedly marked. It bespeaks a great and prolific period when ideas were not lacking. Evidently there was no great searching after novelty, the gold was not beaten thin, apparently there was a profusion of intellectual force behind the factory. The difference is noticeable as soon as the great period is passed, when one falls on barren ways and thinly eked out inventions, the long years of the dreary twilight.

The love of landscape especially appealed to Copenhagen. The colours of the ceramic artist have limitations peculiarly their own. Atmosphere is rare in overglaze painting. There is a tendency to prettiness and an absence of breadth. But with pigments so refractory there are instances of work surprisingly powerful. Single colour scenes fare best, and there is one example in purple, poor enough medium, which has qualities almost suggesting the strength of a Dutch etching, as shown on a cup and saucer in the Dansk Folke Museum. The picturesque in colour finds its exposition in two octagonal dishes with sporting subjects. The one shows a man with a hound (illustrated, p. 93), and the other a man with a red coat engaged in the pastime of hawking.

Vases with portraits secured their patrons. There is one at the Kunstindustri Museum at Bergen; with the portrait of G. W. Rabener, born at Leipsic in 1714 and died in 1771, the friend of Klopstock, and the good-humoured satirist of German bourgeois society.

Apart from colour and decoration, there is the fine modelling. The symmetry of the more important vases, instinct with decorative qualities of the highest order, having ornament in relief, moulded garlands, gay Cupids, or mask handles of some wood-god, is always paramount. Rarely is there a false note.

To form and the mastery of the difficulties and the due observance of the technique of the potter, it is necessary to devote another chapter in which the illustrations convey sufficient evidence to show that projecting limbs and fantastic shapes more suitable to the metal-worker were eschewed at Copenhagen. The essentials of ceramics were never lost sight of by the band of modellers working under Müller.

National Sentiment.—There is a vein of sentiment, very pleasing and very piquant, running through much of the work of this period. It is the under-note of the potter, who, as other potters of other nations have before him, desired to convey a written message as well as the message in line, in colour, and in beauty of form that he set before his generation. Centuries before Müller, the Chinese potter revelled in his inscriptions. Potters the world over apparently are poets. On an old Chinese porcelain vase painted in blue, with a garden scene by moonlight, the following inscription in Chinese is found:—

"Heaven and earth are the associates of creation, as light and darkness are the passing guests of a hundred generations. Fleeting life is like a dream; how long do we enjoy it? It was this knowledge that made men in the old days trim the midnight lamp. And now Yang Chun invites us with smoke to illuminate the world with literature, to associate the fragrant gardens of the peach and the plum, and to talk of happiness. All graciously join me, and as they chant and sing, I alone am ashamed; they become vivacious, I in solitude rejoice. With loud talk they grow merry; a scholar's feast is spread, and sitting amid the flowers we pass the goblet quickly and drink till we are drunken. When the moon is not in its splendour, how can one expatiate on its ecstasy? But if my verses are not perfect I am fined the customary gold and the embarrassing wine."

Here is the Chinese potter—almost Viking-like in his song of the wine-cup in place of the wassail-bowl. Or shall it be the Persian astronomer-poet Omar Khayyám with his—

The Grape that can with Logic absolute
The Two-and-seventy jarring Sects confute:
The subtle Alchemist that in a Trice
Life's leaden Metal into Gold transmute.

The Staffordshire potters to a man loved a rhymed couplet on a jug or mug or punch-bowl, and their crude efforts amuse the latter-day collector. Their subjects were varied in character—loyalty, naval victories, courtship, and conviviality, with a smack of religion, as, for instance:—

Drink to live and live to die
That you may live eternally.

There are many pretty sentiments found on Müller's ware. We have already quoted one (p. 87), and there are many mottoes inscribed in Danish on the porcelain of his period. There is the long inscription on the cup with his portrait (see p. 69), and there are others which we have translated as follows:—

Art bends nature to herself that clay
By magic is transformed to gold alway;

and an inscription on another example, translated runs:—

Long live the King, and glorious be his reign;
Long live ourselves to drink this toast again.

In the collection at Rosenborg Castle there is a cup and saucer upon which the letter F is painted in forget-me-nots. It is dated November 22, 1797, with this inscription:—

Uforglemmelige ungdomsaar for mig!
(Years of youth, unforgettable for me!)

We wonder for whom this initial F stands. The permanently abiding sentiment enshrined behind the glass case is to-day as fresh as the forget-me-nots. What romance lies hidden in these four Danish words burnt into the clay? But the records are silent, and F the giver or the receiver is turned into dust, while the potter's clay stands to symbolize an old-world story of the days when youthful ambitions and dreams lit up the memory.

TABLE OF MARKS[5]

Found on Royal Copenhagen porcelain with decoration painted overglaze of the Frantz Heinrich Müller period (1775-1801).

These signatures and initials of painters and modellers, either painted or incised, are found in conjunction with the usual factory mark of the three blue lines.

General

The usual Factory Mark, in blue, found alone or in addition to painter's or modeller's signature or initials.

This mark was adopted at the suggestion of Queen Juliane Marie in 1775, and symbolizes the three waterways of Denmark—the Sound, and the Great and Little Belts.

This mark has been used on all porcelain made at the Royal Copenhagen Factory, both with overglaze and underglaze painted decoration, since that date.

N.B.—From 1773-1775 the porcelain of the Copenhagen factory made by Müller bore no mark.

Signature of Anton Carl Luplau, who came to Copenhagen in 1776, and died in 1795.

A Bust of Queen Juliane Marie at Rosenborg Castle bears this signature on base:—

Signature of Hans Clio, who was working at the factory prior to 1779, and who died in 1786.

Peter Heinrich Benjamin Lehmann. Came to the factory in 1780. Died 1808. Painter of landscapes, figures, and birds.

Signature of Hans Christopher Ondrup (1779-1787). Sometimes signed Ondrup mahlt (Ondrup painted it). Painted signature frequently in red.

This signature in full has been traced from an example in the collection of Count Chr. Danneskjold-Samsöe, at Gissenfeldt.

Signature of Andreas Hald (1781-1797), modeller and sculptor. Frequently marked his pieces in full or with initials AH incised. In some instances his initials are painted in blue on side of base, as in Figure of Flute Player (illustrated, p. 127).

Jesper Johansen Holm. Born 1747. Member of Royal Academy. Incised mark, HOLM 1780 on Statuette at National Museum, Stockholm. (See illustration, p. 115.) I HOLM 1781 incised marked on a Bust of Prince Frederik at Kunstindustri Museum, Copenhagen.

Signature of Johan Christoph Baÿer. Came to Copenhagen in 1768. Died 1812. Landscape painter, followed the style of Johann Christoph Dietsche, of Nuremberg (1710-1769). Engaged on painting the flowers in the Flora Danica service.

The mark of Jacob Schmidt, modeller and sculptor. He was, in 1779, a pupil at the factory in his fourteenth year. He died in 1807. Many of his pieces have his initials incised. An example at the Dansk Folke Museum, Copenhagen, has this mark together with the three lines incised, which is an exceedingly rare mark.

Incised mark on a cream cup and cover at the Kunstindustri Museum, Copenhagen, decorated with purple flowers and rococo ornamentation, gilded, and having scale-pattern in red. This mark (signifying that the piece belongs to the Christian VII era) is unusual. This may be conjectured to be a specimen made by Müller prior to 1775, that is, before the adoption of the mark of the three blue lines.

The incised mark of Hans Meehl, who was a modeller at the factory in 1791. This mark is found on a polychrome Figure of a Man in national costume (Norsk Bjergmund), at the Kunstindustri Museum, Copenhagen.

This mark is incised on the base of a polychrome figure of a Woman with Hens at the Kunstindustri Museum, Copenhagen.

LIST OF LEADING PAINTERS AND MODELLERS[6]

Who worked at the Royal factory under the Direction of Frantz Heinrich Müller (1773-1801).

Anton Carl Luplau. 1776-1795.

Was at the Fürstenberg factory for eighteen years. Müller visited Luplau at Brunswick in 1776, and on November 14th an agreement was signed, and Luplau joined the Copenhagen factory as modelling-master. He died in 1795. He was a perfect craftsman. Many of his pieces were signed, e.g. the Bust of Queen Juliane Marie. Luplau made many of the models for the Flora Danica service, and executed 20 Norwegian types after the well-known sandstone figures at Fredensborg.

Claus Tvede. 1775-1783.

Sculptor and modeller at the factory. He is supposed to have made the Statuette of the Hereditary Prince Frederik after the design by Ludovico Grossi, which piece bears the initials of the modeller Andreas Hald.

Johan Christoph Baÿer. 1776-1812.

Born in Nuremberg 1738. Came to Denmark in 1768. Agreement signed on November 16, 1776, when he entered the service of the factory. He died in his seventy-fifth year, in 1812. Landscape painter; followed the style of Johann Christoph Dietsche, Nuremberg landscape painter (1710-1769). Executed drawings for Holmskjold's book on Danish Fungi. Entrusted with the work of flower painting on the Flora Danica service.

Hans Clio. Working before 1779. Died in 1786.

Painter. Appointed drawing-master to train the pupils at the factory. His signature appears on some of the porcelain with landscapes painted by him.

Lars Hansen. 1777-1800.

Born in 1739. In 1777 he is noted as being one of the best painters in blue underglaze ware. He died in 1800.

Jacob Schmidt. 1779-1807.

Born in 1764. Modeller and sculptor. At factory in 1779 as pupil in modelling in his fourteenth year. Many of his pieces are marked with his initials incised.

Hans Christoph Ondrup. 1779-1787.

Painter. His signature, or his initials, painted in red, is found on several pieces.

Peter Heinrich Benjamin Lehmann. 1780-1808.

Born in 1752 at Hamburg. Came to the factory from Berlin in 1780. Was naturalized in 1781 and died in 1808. He was a painter of landscapes, figures, and birds.

G. Kalleberg. 1780-1810.

Modeller of figures and repoussé worker. He appears to have had a large share in the production of figures and moulds, and there is presumptive evidence that his work was of a superlative character.

Jesper Johansen Holm. 1780-1802.

Modeller. Born in 1747. Member of the Royal Academy. Trained by Wiedevelt, the sculptor. His statuettes are finely executed. See A Hero (with I HOLM 1780 incised mark), illustrated, p. 115, at National Museum, Stockholm. He became model-master in 1802.

Abildgaard. 1780-

Danish artist and sculptor, returned to Copenhagen from Continental travels in 1777, and brought new impulses. Consulted as adviser to factory in regard to art matters and correctness of modelling.

Martin Cadewitz. 1780-1791.

Served eleven years at factory. Died in 1791.

Johan Camrath, Senior. 1780-1796.

Portrait painter. Executed work for the factory till 1796. Died in 1814, in his seventy-sixth year. He was engaged on fine vases, and painted grey medallion panel portraits of Queen Juliane Marie, and other royalties, for important pieces. There is a small cup at Rosenborg Castle with the portrait of P. A. Heiberg painted by him. He was not permanently at the factory, but undertook work of a highly artistic nature.

Nicolaj Christian Faxoe. 1783-1810.

Born in 1762. Pupil at the factory in painting, 1783. Flower painter. Worked at the factory till his death in 1810.

Sören Preus. 1784-

Modeller. Executed the delicate flowers in relief on vases, baskets, and groups. The vases with Cupids and garlands, and the magnificent vase, with portrait of Queen Juliane Marie painted by Camrath, having a Cupid seated on body of vase amidst a garland of exquisitely moulded flowers and two lions finely modelled on cover, is the work of Sören Preus.

The baskets of flowers and bouquets and ornaments in the dessert centre pieces of the Flora Danica service suggest his master-hand.

Elias Meyer. 1785-1809.

Born in 1763 at Copenhagen, trained at Dresden. Flower and landscape painter. He occasionally marked pieces with his name. His work is not in the first flight. He died in 1809 as member of the Royal Academy.

M. Meyer. 1784-1792.

This artist was mentioned in conjunction with Camrath by Count Louis de Boisgelin, who visited the factory thirteen years after it had been founded. M. Meyer "is much esteemed for the beauty of his designs." It appears that both he and Camrath were not actually in the factory service on a fixed salary, but received payment for each piece executed.

Andreas Hald. 1781-1797.

Modeller and sculptor. This artist modelled a number of gracefully conceived figures. He frequently signed his work either A. Hald or with initials, incised, sometimes initials painted in blue, as on figure of Flute Player. See illustration, p. 127.

Johan Arentz. 1786-1796.

N. Bau. 1791-1820.

Landscape painter, animals and figures, genre subjects of peasants, and also silhouettes. Bau was the head painter from 1812. He died in 1820.

Many of his landscape subjects are painted in purple.

Johannes Ludvig Camrath, Junior. 1794-

Flower and fruit painter. Born in 1779. Became pupil at factory in 1794. Died in 1849.

Carl Fridrich Thomaschefsky. 1780-

This painter, originally trained at Berlin, worked only a short time at the factory. A colleague of Lehmann.

Raben Svardahlyn. Hans Jacob Hansen. Christian Ahrensborg. Matthias Wolstrup. Schaltz.

These painters were engaged on the underglaze mussel-blue painted ware during the Müller régime, together with Lars Hansen, who, in 1777, was considered the leading painter in this style.

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