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Most Delft blue lamps are converted vases; this base was made as one at the Ram factory in Arnhem, and such bases are rarely found. It is painted by hand in tones of cobalt on a white ground with a chinoiserie garden of flowers and a peacock.
The underside carries a hand-painted mark in blue: "Delfts Blauw," "RAM," "Made in Holland." This is the script mark Plateelbakkerij Ram used from 1935 until the factory closed in 1969, which places the base in the middle decades of the twentieth century.
The pleated shade is Poppies linen in the Papavero colourway by the London designer Ellen Merchant. The pattern began as one of her linocuts and is screen-printed by hand in England: rows of interlacing, symmetrical stems and poppy heads in rust red and burnt orange on a warm ivory ground. It is a contemporary pattern in the Arts and Crafts manner.
About Plateelbakkerij Ram
N.V. Plateelbakkerij Ram was established in Arnhem in 1921, initially to produce the designs of Theo Colenbrander, among the most original Dutch ceramic artists of his era. From the mid-1920s the factory turned increasingly to tableware and decorative pottery, and it became known for hand-painted Delftware in blue and white and in polychrome. Ram closed in 1969. Its Delft blue production is valued today for the quality of its painting.
