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Author Topic: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???  (Read 8539 times)

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Offline azelismia

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #40 on: August 28, 2009, 06:31:59 PM »
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Offline azelismia

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #41 on: August 28, 2009, 06:33:30 PM »



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Offline Ivo

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #42 on: August 28, 2009, 07:03:23 PM »
you seem to say that there is a quality to iridescence which is indicative of a maker or even a country or origin. Well, there is not - so why not get acquainted with the art of iridescence which is best illustrated in the Held works around the corner where all pieces are iridised ?  You seem to say that techniques have changed in the past 100 years or so. But they have not. You seem to suggest this piece is French - against all odds. And you should not take this personal.

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Offline azelismia

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #43 on: August 28, 2009, 07:07:50 PM »
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Offline azelismia

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #44 on: August 28, 2009, 07:51:39 PM »

I have NEVER said that I thought this piece was french. please re-read my posts.

What is funny here is that you and I are the only people in this thread that do not think it is french. I don't think it's impossible that it's french because you just never know. I just do not think it's the most likely theory as there are NO french makers that regularly put out a high quality iridescent ware. I think its more likely to be American, English Or Bohemian as they did put out large quantities of high quality iridescent glass. The styling elements are also most like others from Bohemia. But England also did a lot of similar work to Bohemia. America put out all kinds of crazy stuff.

as far as I am concerned it could be from anywhere in the world right now as there are no real solid clues.

but basically what I come away from with your original post is that if someone disagrees with you, they are not showing you respect to your mind. I think that is flawed. You do not learn if you do not question. it does not show lack of respect.

as it was I was "respecting" the opinions of others here in trying to find a reason why everyone keeps saying France for this piece.

your nose I suppose is entirely clean.

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Offline krsilber

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #45 on: August 28, 2009, 08:02:05 PM »
Grovers' Carved and Decorated European Art Glass shows four Galle pieces, "all with a slight iridescent surface."  They also say that de Caranza was probably best known for his iridescent finishes.

What about the iridescence on this piece says it's particularly high quality?  Not being catty, I'm just curious what separates it, and what makes a low-quality iridescent surface.

Here's what I see; please tell me, Alisa or Craig, if this is wrong:  I see the iridescence on the surface, which would have been sprayed on after the piece was formed (not a particularly difficult procedure these days, anyway).  When in shadow, so the iridescence doesn't hide what's beneath, I see a golden layer with lighter waves that follow the contour of the texture (apart from the diagonal lines).  This is under the iridescent layer, which is only a few molecules thick.

(I wonder if the dark specks on it could be larger bits of oxides??)

The ribboning and texture could easily be explained if the golden layer were enamel (which is, after all, just modified glass), but since it's not, I'm curious about how it was done.  (Pretty silly, I suppose, to be so interested in technique when I'm not even a glassmaker myself!)  No big deal, though it could be a clue as to maker if another example were found.

Just so I'm not lumped in any particular camp, I really don't know where it's from.

Kristi


"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science."

- Albert Einstein

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Offline obscurities

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #46 on: August 28, 2009, 11:18:10 PM »
Kristi,

I will have to let Alisa confirm this, but if memory serves me correctly the iridescence is over a clear layer, which in the area where the iridescence is thin, allows the inner white opalescent vessel show through.  Depending on what angle the iridescence was applied from, the "shadow" effect of the higher areas of the texture would account for variations in the intensity of the iridescence as a result of thickness of application.

Nothing on the piece about the iridescence says higher quality than the iridescence on many other nice pieces. The overall visual impact and feel of the piece, having seen and held it to examine it, speaks volumes to the level of execution. For a piece displaying many techniques, it is one of the better executed pieces I have ever seen in person..... None of the images really do the vase justice.......

In general, let me address my thoughts on the "French" controversy.  I started this thread with French being a question of possibility. It was my initial reaction to the piece. Hence, the title includes French?? I did that....  

I originally posted this in the hopes that someone would recognize and identify it before I bid on it at the auction....  No one did, and Alisa had a deeper pocket than mine at the time of sale, so she is the proud owner, and not I.  :cry:  :cry:

I have researched and looked, since the auction, for information that would tend to lead me one direction or another and have not found anything that I would consider to be solid enough to make me lean a new direction on the piece.  I really have no vested interest in where it is from, and I really do not care at all, I only am curious, as is Alisa since she owns it....  :cry: :cry:  :cry: (I can't help myself).  I understand and hear all of the reasons that people think it may be Bohemian, I personally am inclined to think that if not French, Bohemian is most likely. I do not see the piece as American in any light. I also have a tough time getting behind an English attribution...  There is a little voice, that sometimes speaks to me and when it does I listen, and on this piece it keeps talking French to me.

I would look to the enamel work and the feel and style of it as my greatest indicator....  and I could be all wet here, but my gut says no at this point...  

There is conversation here that no one can locate a French company that did his type of iridescent work, but if the piece were that easy to identify we would not be spending this much time on it. There are French companies, as noted additionally here by Kristi, that did work in iridescent glass, examples are just not that easy to locate....  The fact that this piece is so over the top in execution, yet so difficult to attribute is part of what makes me look in the direction of the less likely.

IMHO if it were Bohemian, with Truitt, Passau catalogs, Ricke, etc...and the many other fine pieces of documentation we have available to us, it would seem to me that somewhere, through all of the documentation, someone would have taken a picture of a piece like this. No one has been able to do that.  

With that said, and with the only other very similar piece we can reference to in a picture is a Loetz attribution by Rago on a piece I would bet heavily is by the same house and not by Loetz, my gut continues to say it feels French.  

In light of all of this, my instincts say look to the unexpected, especially if looking to the much more obvious fails a result.

Craig

 
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Offline azelismia

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #47 on: September 05, 2009, 10:59:49 AM »
I just ran across this kralik piece, while it's not a dead ringer there are some similar style elements.... thoughts?

http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/2511994

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Offline obscurities

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #48 on: September 05, 2009, 03:08:12 PM »
That piece does not strike me as Kralik work... 

Craig
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Offline obscurities

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Re: Cut Back and Gilt Vase - ID Help Please - French? ???
« Reply #49 on: September 05, 2009, 07:09:55 PM »
I stand corrected.... I am posting an image sent to me by Alfredo, not of a Kralik piece like the one you found, but of two other Kralik pieces in the same form..... 

That being said, I do not think the quality of the work on that piece is anywhere near the quality of your vase....

Similar in some ways, but far inferior in execution.....

Craig
I have been told that glass is my mistress......

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