Wine Ewer

This jug was originally one of a pair made by the German emigré silversmith Charles Frederick Kandler. It bears the mark FK, which was registered in 1735 to Kandler, who presumably took over a family workshop from a relative. It is possible that he was related to Johann Joachim Kandler, chief modeler at the Meissen Porcelain Manufactory from 1733 to 1775, who designed the Art Institute’s lively and ornamental monkey band sculpture. Whatever the family relationship might have been, the Kandler style in silver, characterized by a profusion of cast and hammered three-dimensional ornament, emerged in the late 1720s—as early, if not even earlier, than the sculptural style at Meissen. The exuberant decoration of the piece is perfectly balanced with its function. Since it is a wine ewer, it is covered with figures associated with Dionysus (also called Bacchus), the Classical god of wine: a seated infant Pan playing his pipes forms the finial; the spout is in the form of a panther’s head, its shoulders encircled by grapevines; and the handle is a maiden holding a cluster of grapes in her upstretched arms. On the belly of the ewer, cartouches formed of scrolls, shells, and undulating foliage frame infant satyrs and children engaged in various activities: feeding grapes to a panther, reclining on the back of a goat, raising their glasses, and sleeping off the effects of their indulgences.