VOC is the abbreviation of the Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the Dutch East India Company, founded in 1602 and dissolved at the end of the eighteenth century. It was one of the largest and most powerful trading organisations in history, controlling much of the trade between Europe and Asia during the Dutch Golden Age, with its Asian headquarters at Batavia in Java.
The VOC shipped spices, tea, textiles, lacquer and vast quantities of Chinese and Japanese porcelain to Europe, profoundly influencing European taste and inspiring the blue and white wares of Delft. Its interlaced VOC monogram appears on porcelain made for company use, on coins, cannons, bottles, documents and buildings, and objects bearing the mark are keenly collected. Cargoes recovered from VOC shipwrecks have also brought considerable quantities of porcelain to auction, often sold with provenance to a particular wreck. Furniture made in Asian colonies for Dutch settlers, using tropical hardwoods such as ebony and teak, is another collecting field linked to the company. For collectors, the VOC provides a rich context for understanding export porcelain, Dutch colonial furniture and the global exchange of goods and ideas in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
