Rare, early Meissen pair of wagtails. A wagtail sitting on a high tree-trunk base with sculpted branches, its plumage in light relief and finely streaked in naturalistic black-brown and colourful green-blue tones with a little yellow. Polychrome painting. Designed by Johann Gottlieb Kirchner, 1733 or Johann Gottlieb Ehder, 1740. Minimal residue; crossed swords mark. H. 23 cm. Driven by a keen interest in zoology, Augustus the Strong had various animals modelled in porcelain around 1730. The sculptor Johann Gottlieb Kirchner is considered the first modeller at the Meissen manufactory and, together with Johann Joachim Kaendler, created the so-called large animal commission for the porcelain palace planned by Augustus III in the Japanese Palace between 1731 and 1735. In Kirchner's work report from February 1733, the model is listed as "A wagtail sitting on a tree". The wagtail is also mentioned in the work report by J. G. Ehder from 1740, one of Kaendler's employees: "2 wagtails plastered in clay". It is conceivable that Kirchner collaborated with J. J. Kaendler, who, as his successor from 1735, became an outstanding modeller not only in the field of porcelain birds, but of Meissen porcelain sculpture as a whole. Cf. Röbbig, cat. Kabinettstücke, no. 1; Kunze-Köllensperger, coll. Guttmann, no. 97f.; Albiker, no. 142, Pietsch, Meissen Porcelain Sculpture, pp. 169ff. A pair of pendant porcelain figures of a wagtail. Minor restored. Crossed swords mark. Meissen. Circa 1735 - 1740.