A BOULBOUS JAR, VENICE, MASTRO DOMENICO AND COWORKERS, CIRCA 1560-1570 BOULBOUS JAR, VENICE, MASTRO DOMENICO AND COWORKERS, CIRCA 1560-1570 in faience painted in polychrome in blue, yellow, orange yellow, copper green in several shades, tin white, manganese in shades of violet and black brown. On the bottom label of provenance ALTOMANI - PESARO ; h. 28.6 cm, mouth diameter 13.4 cm, foot diameter 12.2 cm Comparative literature D. Thornton, T. Wilson, Italian Renaissance Ceramics, A Catalogue of the British Museum's Collection , London 2009, no. 62 T. Wilson, Maiolica: Italian Renaissance Ceramics in the Metropolitan Museum of Art , New York 2016, pp.268-271, nos. 94A-B and related bibliography R. Perale, Maioliche da farmacia nella Serenissima , Venice 2021, pp. 95-96 n. 82 The pharmaceutical container has a medium-sized globular body and jetted rim, according to the model commonly known as boccia . The decoration consists of a large medallion on the front, enclosed in a robbiana wreath stopped by ribbons, centred by a curled pharmaceutical cartouche and painted with shading and almost naturalistic elements, occupied by the pharmaceutical inscription in Gothic characters Latuga gtd and supported by two dolphins. On either side of the cartouche are two medallions, also framed by a Della Robbia wreath, containing respectively a three-quarter-length female portrait and a male portrait with a laurel-crowned head and characterised by a frowning face and growing beard. The remaining surface of the vase is painted with a triumphal motif with musical cartouches standing out against a cobalt blue background marked by graffiti, in accordance with the custom of Mastro Domenico's Venetian workshop. The figures of dolphins supporting the cartouche appear in vases of great decorative impact, as for example in the albarello in the British Museum with a pharmaceutical cartouche associated with a landscape view and figures of characters (inv. no. 1852,1129.3). The medallion with cartouche is precisely reflected in a copy of bowls conserved at the MET in New York (inv. no. 41100.274 and 41.100.275), one of which is characterised by the presence of two dolphins holding the same cartouche and the other with the depiction of a walnut tree instead of a cartouche. Timothy Wilson, who published the two MET bowls, emphasises how this type of vase was popular in Venetian production from the earliest works, including those dated 1547 for the hospital of Messina. The literature on these vases is now vast and the scholar provides us with further comparisons for these types of vases, possibly in use in the pantries and apothecaries of the great Venetian palaces. The power of the portraits does not go unnoticed, both of the vase under analysis and the comparison vases, which find inspiration in Venetian paintings of the time and in particular the portraits by Veronese. In terms of material and quality, the vase can be attributed to the workshop of Mastro Domenico and collaborators between 1550 and 1570, distinguishing itself from the current production of the Venetian workshop by virtue of the almost prevalent colouring on a yellow background, which is even present as a background to the decoration on the shoulder of the vase, and the presence of the cartouches and trophies painted here with particular care.