12 - The Aesthetic of Smallness

Summary

The smallest and least-studied of the Chelsea porcelain manufactory’s wares are seals for watch fobs and étui, first described in an advertisement of 1754 as “Trinkets for Watches (mounted in gold and unmounted) in various shapes.” Rival manufacturers, Charles Gouyn, near St. James’s Square, produced similar pocket-sized toys and trinkets. At less than an inch in height, these miniatures depicted birds, animals, and amatory subjects, alongside figurines reflecting eighteenth-century society and culture. Aesthetically crude in reduction and compression, the figures are distorted, and over time the details covered in glaze and paint are gradually softened through constant caressing or clinking against a metal fob or étui. Many survive with generic intaglio hardstone matrices mounted in precious metal. Over 200 models have been identified—the majority published in G. E. Bryant’s Chelsea Porcelain Toys (1925)—attesting to the importance of consumer culture at mid-century. Novelties intended as gifts or love tokens, they are inherently charming for their smallness, yet their subject matter frequently touches on bigger issues of globalization, empire, colonialism, and race. These themes privilege the elite market for these wares, exposing the passions, pursuits, prejudices, and obsessions of their customers, who literally held the world in their hands.