Topic: Possible Murano Aventurine Bowl?

[auliya]

Good Afternoon,

This is my first post to your wonderfully informative board, so I hope I don't break any posting rules! I am in Australia and am having some trouble finding out anything about a deep red bowl I have. I think it may be Aventurine, and I was surprised last night to find that the back of it glowed green under UV light (I was checking another piece and it changed colour!). Does anyone have any idea who the maker might be, and if the back might be cased in uranium glass?



Thank you in advance for any information
auliya

[Lustrousstone]

Hi Welcome to the board. The gold looks like adventurine to me, but I don't think the glow is caused by uranium - it's just not bright enough. Also the outer glass looks to be clear, which means the glow is probably caused by manganese used as a decolorant. We also like to see the bottoms of bits of glass because the finish can often give clues to the origin and sometimes date.

[Ivo]

Yes that is Murano, yes that is Aventurine and yes that is a nice bowl!

[auliya]

Thank you for you quick responses :-)
Here are further 2 photos of the back of the bowl (I had to wait until it got dark enough here to photograph under the black light). I don't suppose anyone would know the likely maker?




Thanks again
auliya

[TxSilver]

Your bowl looks like uranium glass to me. Several Italian makers used it on some of their pieces. The metal appears to be copper aventurine. It can be difficult to attribute these types of bowls. Usually they are just considered generic, meaning no one seems to know who made them. Murano-type bowls were also made in other Italian cities. I saw a bowl similar to yours the other day that had a Genuine Venetian Glass label on bottom, so I suspect your is made in Murano.

[Cathy B]

I'd second that it looks it could be uranium. It doesn't look like any manganese glows that I've seen, and perhaps it's just your photograph?

[auliya]

I confess I don't know exactly what a decolourant does, but the green is only on the back of the bowl, not the front where Aventurine is. It is quite a strong colour as well.

Thanks for your help with this, everyone
cheers
auliya

[Lustrousstone]

A decolourant effectively removes the effects of impurities in the sand used to make the glass that give an undesirable colour tinge. The greenish Coke bottles you used to get didn't contain a decolourant. What colour is the glass on the back of the bowl in ordinary light?

[auliya]

Well, it is red, as you can in the picture, I can't really tell if there is a casing of clear over it - but I don't think so. I also just discovered it doesn't need to be in a dark room to go green with the UV light, as you can see.

cheers
auliya

[Lustrousstone]

It must be cased or at least have two different layers if it doesn't glow on the other side. You also never need to go in a dark room to see the uranium glow, although you might need to turn away from a bright light source. IMHO it just doesn't look right for uranium. I would expect something more like this colourwise