No-one likes general adverts, and ours hadn't been updated for ages, so we're having a clear-out and a change round to make the new ones useful to you. These new adverts bring in a small amount to help pay for the board and keep it free for you to use, so please do use them whenever you can, Let our links help you find great books on glass or a new piece for your collection. Thank you for supporting the Board.

Author Topic: pink and white snail  (Read 3083 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline curvature

  • Members
  • **
  • Posts: 5
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #10 on: April 21, 2009, 12:35:53 AM »
Ok well the more I read the more confused I'm getting.  There doesn't seem to be any definitive descriptions that I can find to help me know the difference, and in photos of things that are opaline/opalino/alabastro, the terms seem to be interchanged, sometimes referring to identical items.

Like this one which is listed as both alabastro and opalino: http://www.rubylane.com/shops/murano-glass/item/107
But it looks like it irridesces to me, and then when I tried to find a defnition of opalino I found stuff that said it had flecks of crystaline stuff in it that made it react to light like an opal.  They also have this one: http://www.rubylane.com/shops/eyesnglas/item/2265 but again the colour seems to change on different angles and my snail stays the same colour no matter what angle you're looking at the glass.  That was why I thought maybe it's not opalino.

So then I stumbled across alabastro in my searches, and it seems to fit a bit better (to my completely novice eye): 
http://antiquehelper.rfcsystems.com/Full/224/56224.jpg
http://www.20thcenturyglass.com/images/items/murano_glass/archimedeseguso_glass/segusoglass_mexicans01.jpg
(these are labeled 'mexicans' for some reason. they don't look Mexican to me..)

On this chart though, the alabastro ones (pale white, light rose, and medium rose) seem more like my snail than the opalino examples:
http://www.beadfx.com/catalogue/glasschart.html

On my snail you can see the light passing through it, as if you were looking at it through slightly watered down milk, or really smooth fine wax.  The thin edges of the snail's body and it's little 'horns' are a bit more seethrough but still cloudy. 

Anyway, thanks for your help everyone - I guess I'll never know unless I find an expert here in New Zealand who can look at it in real life, and it's not that big of a deal :)

Moderator: Linked images changed from display to links

Offline TxSilver

  • Members
  • **
  • Posts: 2808
  • Gender: Female
    • San Marcos Art Glass
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #11 on: April 21, 2009, 02:25:12 AM »
 :) I'm afraid that our words can get a bit confusing. You picked out excellent examples. The swan and bowl look opalino. Something I read about alabastro from a glassworker is that it tends to crack when it is cased -- something about incompatibility of glass, but that goes beyond my knowledge. One will rarely see alabastro that is completely cased if this is true.

The pictures you showed are alabastro. I love the bird. It looks like a baby, the way it is holding its mouth. The people look like Chinese figures by Archimede Seguso. They did many of these.

Sorry for the confusion. You have the snail in hand, so you can tell if it is alabastro better than we can. As I said before, when I looked more carefully, it looked like you could be right. You seem to know your alabastro and opalino, so don't let me confuse you. Thanks for posting the chart.
Anita
San Marcos Art Glass
Visit the Murano Zoo
http://sites.google.com/site/muranozoo/

Offline curvature

  • Members
  • **
  • Posts: 5
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #12 on: April 21, 2009, 03:08:13 AM »
Thanks :)

I found this forum thread as well: http://www.fossilfly.com/Forums/showthread.php?p=3536
Some of the stuff they've said about it is really interesting, including some further discussion on 'casing' alabastro glass.

I'll try out the trick with the light tonight and see if it does anything interesting..

Offline Ivo

  • Author
  • Members
  • ***
  • Posts: 8215
  • Gender: Male
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #13 on: April 21, 2009, 07:09:58 AM »
It is not that difficult.

The French first made opaline - which is a solid opal glass in soft pastel tones - in the 1820s. It was often mounted with gilded bronze trim and was very expensive.

The Italians discovered that the same colour effect could be achieved much cheaper by casing a thin transparent colour over a lattimo (milk glass).  It allowed lighter and larger hollow vessels to be blown with relative ease, it was ideally suited for lamp shades, and additional surface treatments were possible (iridescence, satination, enameling etc.). This, they named Opalino. 

Italian glass makers also made true opaline - known as either Opalino or Albastro.  Opalino just denotes a pastel semi-opaque glass but says nothing about the technique: coloured in the mass or cased.  Albastro is coloured in the mass by definition. The colour cased opalino was used a lot in Empoli. The more difficult solid colour was favoured in Murano.




Offline TxSilver

  • Members
  • **
  • Posts: 2808
  • Gender: Female
    • San Marcos Art Glass
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #14 on: April 23, 2009, 12:09:46 AM »
So then I stumbled across alabastro in my searches, and it seems to fit a bit better (to my completely novice eye): 
http://antiquehelper.rfcsystems.com/Full/224/56224.jpg
http://www.20thcenturyglass.com/images/items/murano_glass/archimedeseguso_glass/segusoglass_mexicans01.jpg
(these are labeled 'mexicans' for some reason. they don't look Mexican to me..)Anyway, thanks for your help everyone - I guess I'll never know unless I find an expert here in New Zealand who can look at it in real life, and it's

I discovered why the figures may have been called Mexican. Leslie Pina has two Mexicans and one Chinese figure in one of her pictures in Archimede Seguso. The first sentence has the figures called "Mexicans." If one were not to read further, one could end up thinking that it is what the Chinese figure is. The Mexicans have sombreros much different than the Chinese pointed hat. Sometimes people can read just enough to get the wrong answer. Sounds a lot like me -- I like to look at pictures. ;D
Anita
San Marcos Art Glass
Visit the Murano Zoo
http://sites.google.com/site/muranozoo/

Offline curvature

  • Members
  • **
  • Posts: 5
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #15 on: April 23, 2009, 12:26:55 AM »
True, but I was basing it on the name of the image itself: segusoglass_mexicans01.jpg


Offline TxSilver

  • Members
  • **
  • Posts: 2808
  • Gender: Female
    • San Marcos Art Glass
Re: pink and white snail
« Reply #16 on: April 23, 2009, 01:22:14 AM »
Oh, I wasn't talking about you, curvature. I was referring to the link. I should have been more clear.
Anita
San Marcos Art Glass
Visit the Murano Zoo
http://sites.google.com/site/muranozoo/

 

SMF spam blocked by CleanTalk
Visit the Glass Encyclopedia
link to glass encyclopedia
Visit the Online Glass Museum
link to glass museum


This website is provided by Angela Bowey, PO Box 113, Paihia 0247, New Zealand