A rare Whieldon type model of a boy riding a water buffalo, circa 1755-60


After a Chinese original, the buffalo modelled without a base, its comical face turned slightly to one side, its body washed in brown save for the eyes, mouth and hoofs, the boy sitting sideways on a saddlecloth and picked out in blue and brown, holding a flame-like object in each hand, 19.8cm high
|Both the modelling and colouring closely follow a Chinese original. Another example is illustrated by Leslie B Grigsby, The Henry H Weldon Collection (1990), p.354. The leg of a water buffalo was excavated at the Fenton Vivian site but the models are probably not exclusively the product of Thomas Whieldon's factory. The buffaloes are also recorded standing beside trees, with reclining riders as shown by Captain R K Price, Astbury, Whieldon, and Ralph Wood Figures, and Toby Jugs (1922), pl.XXVI, no.32 and unaccompanied as shown by Sir Harold Mackintosh, Bt., Early English Figure Pottery (1938), p.29, nos.24 and 26