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      CHINA [ASIA]

      Clay figures of seated Chinese man and woman

      late eighteenth to early nineteenth century

      RCIN 176

      Most of these items were part of the decoration of the Chinese Drawing Room at Carlton House, completed by 1792. Unusually for a scheme of this early date, a visual record has come down to us, published in Thomas Sheraton’s The Cabinet Makers’ and Upholsterers’ Drawing Book. This was the earliest incarnation of George IV’s enthusiasm for chinoiserie, which reached its greatest intensity in the redecoration of the Royal Pavilion at Brighton twenty-five years later. The scheme was overseen by the Prince’s dealerdecorator, Dominique Daguerre, who commissioned much of the decoration from Parisian craftsmen. The peacock vases were later acquisitions and were first displayed at Brighton, as was the Seated Mandarin, which replaces one used in Carlton House.

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