The Tea Party
Images from a variety of print sources decorate this box. The image on the lid is a variation of Robert Hancock’s engraving "The Tea Party," possibly after Nicolas Lancret’s 1739-41 painting The Four Times of Day: Morning. Three out of the four vignettes on the box’s sides are reproduced on plate 32 of Robert Sayer’s influential book of designs, The Ladies Amusement. The image on the remaining side is derived from Pensant-ils au Raisin?, a 1747 painting by François Boucher, later engraved by Jacques Philippe Le Bas (1970.522.2). The enameller may have been familiar either with Le Bas’ print or with Hancock’s design, known as Peeping Tom, adapted from Boucher’s original composition. Lastly, the still life on the bottom of the box is by Hancock and reproduced on plate 74 of The Ladies Amusement.
Designed to hold snuff (a scented, powdered form of tobacco), snuffboxes were fashionable accessories for both men and women in the mid-eighteenth century. Snuff was believed to have a host of medicinal benefits, helping to prevent diseases and awaken the senses. It could also signal sensibility in genteel social encounters. There was an art not only to gracefully pinching and inhaling snuff, but to navigating the unspoken social codes that dictated etiquette for offering snuff to others.
Snuffboxes were just one of many luxurious trinkets, known as "toys," through which wealth and taste could be displayed. Some toys were functional, intended to store cosmetic products, foodstuffs, or snuff; others were intended for no purpose other than to delight. Some were made of precious metals, like gold or silver, and were sold at correspondingly high prices; others employed relatively inexpensive materials and were thus available to the expanding middle classes.
Enameled objects like this one, intended to imitate the lustrous quality of porcelain, were among the more affordable goods sold at toyshops across London and in fashionable English resort towns. Though often called "Battersea enamels" in common parlance (referring to the manufactory at York House, Battersea, operating only between 1753 and 1756), we rarely know exactly where individual pieces were made. The main centers of enamel production were in London, South Staffordshire (particularly in Bilston and Wednesbury), and Birmingham.
By the middle of the eighteenth century, technological innovations had made it possible to roll copper, instead of the far costlier gold, into very thin sheets. Powdered glass mixed with minerals (to determine the opacity and color of the enamel) would then be applied onto the copper sheets and fired at high temperatures. A design—whether a famous portrait, generic pastoral scene, or floral motif— could be painted on by hand or copied from an engraving through the newly invented process of transfer printing. Many enameled objects combined both methods of decoration and would be refired after the application of each new layer or color.
Designed to hold snuff (a scented, powdered form of tobacco), snuffboxes were fashionable accessories for both men and women in the mid-eighteenth century. Snuff was believed to have a host of medicinal benefits, helping to prevent diseases and awaken the senses. It could also signal sensibility in genteel social encounters. There was an art not only to gracefully pinching and inhaling snuff, but to navigating the unspoken social codes that dictated etiquette for offering snuff to others.
Snuffboxes were just one of many luxurious trinkets, known as "toys," through which wealth and taste could be displayed. Some toys were functional, intended to store cosmetic products, foodstuffs, or snuff; others were intended for no purpose other than to delight. Some were made of precious metals, like gold or silver, and were sold at correspondingly high prices; others employed relatively inexpensive materials and were thus available to the expanding middle classes.
Enameled objects like this one, intended to imitate the lustrous quality of porcelain, were among the more affordable goods sold at toyshops across London and in fashionable English resort towns. Though often called "Battersea enamels" in common parlance (referring to the manufactory at York House, Battersea, operating only between 1753 and 1756), we rarely know exactly where individual pieces were made. The main centers of enamel production were in London, South Staffordshire (particularly in Bilston and Wednesbury), and Birmingham.
By the middle of the eighteenth century, technological innovations had made it possible to roll copper, instead of the far costlier gold, into very thin sheets. Powdered glass mixed with minerals (to determine the opacity and color of the enamel) would then be applied onto the copper sheets and fired at high temperatures. A design—whether a famous portrait, generic pastoral scene, or floral motif— could be painted on by hand or copied from an engraving through the newly invented process of transfer printing. Many enameled objects combined both methods of decoration and would be refired after the application of each new layer or color.
Artwork Details
- Title: The Tea Party
- Engraver: lid and bottom based on prints by Robert Hancock (British, Burslem 1730–1817 Bristol)
- Artist: lid possibly after Nicolas Lancret (French, Paris 1690–1743 Paris)
- Publisher: three sides and bottom based on prints published by Robert Sayer (British, Sunderland 1725–1794 Bath)
- Engraver: one side possibly after Jacques Philippe Le Bas (French, Paris 1707–1783 Paris)
- Engraver: same side possibly after Robert Hancock (British, Burslem 1730–1817 Bristol)
- Artist: same side after François Boucher (French, Paris 1703–1770 Paris)
- Date: ca. 1765–1770
- Culture: British, South Staffordshire
- Medium: Enameled copper
- Dimensions: Overall (confirmed): 1 3/4 × 3 3/16 × 2 1/2 in. (4.4 × 8.1 × 6.4 cm)
- Classification: Enamels-Painted
- Credit Line: Gift of Irwin Untermyer, 1964
- Object Number: 64.101.813
- Curatorial Department: European Sculpture and Decorative Arts
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ca. 1765–1770
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ca. 1770–80
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ca. 1770–80
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ca. 1765–70
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