c. 1780 Pink Foil Silhouette Ring

A c. 1780 continental European (possibly Austrian) silhouette ring, containing a profile against deep pink foil, all set beneath domed quartz crystal, the setting worked in 14k rose gold. Silhouettes were more commonly called ‘shades’ or ‘profiles’ during the 18th century. These shadow-like images became widely popular in late 18th c Europe alongside Neoclassicism, and were possibly inspired or influenced by Greek black-figure pottery, as well as accounts of the ancients tracing profiles of faces, as thrown upon a wall by the light of a lamp (see Pliney the Elder, Natural History, Chapter 5 Book XXXV). In 1775, the physiognomist Johann Kaspar Lavater further popularized silhouettes by publishing his hugely popular Essays on Physiognomy, which was illustrated with numerous black profiles, making the argument that “Shades are the truest representation that can be given of man”. Most 18th c shade specialists were itinerant artists who worked out of booths at crowded fairs, markets, or tourist sites, relying on speed and a large client base to compete with portrait miniaturists. The silhouettist John Miers for instance advertised that he could produce the “Most striking Likenesses taken in One Minute”. Shades were created by placing a sitter between a bright light and a sheet of paper, the outline of the shadow being then traced onto paper. Skilled specialists were able to “reduce to any size” the resulting image for rings and various jewelry by working up a miniaturized copy. This is why larger silhouettes were sometimes cut from blackened paper, but shades in rings were almost always hand-painted. The fast and affordable nature of the silhouette facilitated its dissemination as a fashionable token of sentiment between friends or family; despite its start as a kind of ‘portraiture for cheap’, silhouettes took on poetic significance in sentimental and mourning jewelry to represent the lingering shadow—and therefore memory or presence—of a loved one, living or dead. Many well-made gold silhouette rings have survived (see Koch Collection 1037, 1033, 1036, 1008). The present ring is almost certainly continental European in origin: shades set against colored foils appear to be continental, while English examples were almost always rendered on a plain white ground. The quality of the hot pink foil resembles that of Koch collection no. 1008, identified as possibly Austrian. The setting, elegant and Neoclassical, resembles the clean ‘tipped’ rub-over collet, smooth posterior, and triangular shoulders of a c. 1780 silhouette ring in the British Museum (AF.1483).
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