Object size: 0.7 x 15.5 x 15.5 cm
This porcelain plaque features an enamel painted portrait of Dr Lim Boon Keng and his second wife, Grace Pek Ha Yin. It was probably commissioned as a wedding gift to the couple. and is an example of decorative European porcelain that would have been displayed in a Peranakan household. Porcelain portrait plaques were popular from the late 18th century onwards and were chiefly manufactured in France and Germany. An impressed mark on the reverse features a crown over a shield containing the letters “CMHR”, a mark of the German porcelain manufacturer “Porzellanfabrik C. M Hutschenreuther” of Hohenberg, Bavaria, which operated from 1814 to 1969. One of the leading Peranakan activists in the early 20th century, Dr Lim Boon Keng was an advocate for educational and political reforms in both the Straits Settlements and China.
