Franz Anton Bustelli

Franz Anton Bustelli (April 12, 1723 – April 18, 1763) was a Swiss-born German modeller for the Bavarian Nymphenburg Porcelain Manufactory from 1754 to his death in 1763. He is widely regarded as the finest modeller of porcelain in the Rococo style: "if the art of European porcelain finds its most perfect expression in the rococo style, so the style finds its most perfect expression in the work of Bustelli".

Bustelli was born in Locarno in Italian-speaking Switzerland, and died in Munich, Bavaria, just after his 40th birthday. Few details of his life are known, but he trained as a sculptor, probably mostly in wood, in Italy. He spoke and wrote German fluently, and may have grown up in Bavaria.

Bustelli joined the Neudeck factory in Munich in 1754, the year after it was established by the local ruler, Maximilian III Joseph, Elector of Bavaria. That year the elector placed Sigmund Graf von Haimhausen in charge of the factory. The factory moved in 1761 to the grounds of the Elector's Nymphenburg Palace near Munich, where it remains today, but its products are normally referred to as Nymphenburg for the earlier period as well. It was a relatively late entrant to the group of porcelain factories set up in Europe as the secrets of the techniques developed by Johann Friedrich Böttger for the Meissen factory in Saxony (established in 1710) gradually leaked out. Bustelli was rapidly promoted to Modellmeister, or head modeller, and created moulds for about 150 new models for Neudeck and Nymphenburg.

His first figures were small classical gods and putti, followed by a series of street vendors, as well as some larger religious figures, including a Crucifixion, that follow directly from the style of South German woodcarving of the period. In a series of Chinese and Turkish figures, from about 1756 onwards, reflecting the Rococo taste for chinoiserie and Orientalism, he reached the height of his powers, seen in the mature figures of the following years. The most famous of his works are a set of eight pairs of male and female single figures whose glances interact, portraying characters in the Commedia dell'arte (1759–60). These were followed by groups of paired lovers and other figures, such as hounds. He was involved in the design of a large dinner service for the Elector, though the elaborate individual paintings, by Joseph Zächenberger, were not completed until after his death.

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