James Tassie

James Tassie (born July 15, 1735, Pollokshaws, near Glasgow, Scot.—died June 1, 1799, London, Eng.) was a Scottish gem engraver and modeler known for reproductions of engraved gems and for portrait medallions (round or oval tablets bearing figures), both made from a hard, fine-textured substance that he developed with a physician, Henry Quin.

Tassie originally worked as a stonemason, studying modeling at the Foulis Academy, Glasgow, during the same period. In 1763 he moved to Dublin, where he worked as laboratory assistant to Quin, whose hobby was copying antique gems. Together they devised a white enamel composition especially suited for gemstone replicas. The formula remained secret, shared only by Tassie’s nephew William Tassie (1777–1860), also a modeler, who worked with him. Later analysis of the material indicated that it was a glass of high lead content, readily fusible, and capable of taking an impression from a mold or matrix upon attaining a pasty consistency. Tassie made his pastes in both opaque and transparent forms and coloured them to resemble a great variety of gems. He made both the sunken, engraved designs known as intaglios and the relief designs called cameos.

In 1766 Tassie moved to London, where he received commissions to duplicate many famous gems, both ancient and modern. In the early 1780s he was commissioned by Catherine the Great, empress of Russia, to reproduce thousands of pieces for her famous collection, which is now at the Hermitage, St. Petersburg.

Tassie’s Catalogue of Impressions in Sulphur of Antique and Modern Gems (1775) listed pastes in intaglio and cameo forms sold directly by him and also by London jewelers. In 1791 A Descriptive Catalogue of a General Collection of Ancient and Modern Gems, illustrated with 57 plates and describing more than 15,000 reproductions, was issued.

Tassie supplied molds for many pieces cast by the Wedgwood pottery factory, including those for most of the intaglios and cameos listed in their 1773 catalog. Tassie’s portrait medallions, his best-known original works, included many eminent contemporaries among their subjects. They were modeled from life in wax and cast in white paste.

After Tassie’s death his nephew continued to make gem reproductions, among them additional pieces for the Russian imperial collection, and also made original portrait medallions, including two of his uncle. His paste seals and gems, inscribed with mottoes and emblems, were especially popular, and he published catalogs of such pieces in 1816, 1820, and 1830. Adding to the collection started by his uncle, he eventually gathered a famous collection of more than 20,000 pieces, including original works by several artists who had been employed by his uncle. William Tassie retired in 1840, after working for 40 years. He willed many molds and impressions to the Board of Manufactures, Edinburgh, and these items were later included in collections at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery of Scotland.