figure PRINZESSINNENGRUPPE

Product description

On December 24, 1793, the future King Frederick Wilhelm III married Luise von Mecklenburg-Strelitz, while his brother Ludwig married Friederike, Luise's younger sister, two days later. The court sculptor Johann Gottfried Schadow produced a life-size clay model of the princesses in 1795. At the same time, a scaled-down version of the PRINZESSINNENGRUPPE in biscuit porcelain was produced for the Königliche Porzellan-Manufaktur in Berlin, which is recorded in the model book under the model number 1246 in August 1796. 88 individual parts were assembled for this masterpiece of porcelain art. Commissioned by the Prussian King Frederick William II. , the double statue of the two princesses was also executed in marble and completed in 1797.

The double statue of the Crown Princess Luise of Prussia (1776-1810) and her sister Princess Friederike (1778-1841), the PRINZESSINNENGRUPPE, was commissioned by the Prussian King Frederick William II. shortly after the marriage of the two sisters from the House of Mecklenburg-Strelitz to his sons, the Prussian Crown Prince Frederick William III (1770-1840) and Prince Ludwig (1773-1796) in December 1793.

Not only the king, who chose the sisters as wives for his sons, but also other contemporaries were taken with the youthful beauty of the two. Goethe wrote in 1793 that "the two young ladies could be considered heavenly apparitions, whose impression will never fade from my mind". This fascination was not only directed at the sitters themselves; Schadow's work also caused a sensation during its presentation at the Berlin Academy exhibition in September 1797. There, the sculptor exhibited a life-size marble version of the PRINZESSINNENGRUPPE (temporarily in the vestibule of the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin), while smaller versions were produced for sale in biscuit porcelain at the Königliche Porzellan-Manufaktur Berlin. An elegant austerity - very much in the spirit of classicism - combined with the grace of the subject always enchants the viewer anew.

The Berlin porcelain manufactory continues to produce this exquisite group of figurines entirely by hand. For this purpose, 88 individually cast porcelain pieces are joined together and fired to form a new work of art in elaborate artistic portrait work.