Topic: Signed Glass

[aa]

I wish you hadn't said that again.  In my opinion a dogmatic attitude doesn't serve discussion, it only causes rifts.

Lets put it another way. Can you think of a good reason for an artist not to sign their work?

Among others, until comparatively recently flexible drives for diamond engraving were quite expensive!  

[aa]

What a fantastic debate! Unfortunately we are still not on line at home, but broadband on order, so evening posting still a bit difficult and daytime...well have to make glass etc!
Just wanted to bring up a thought upon which I'll try and expand later. Signing takes up quite a lot of time! Most places like Orrefors, Lalique, Kosta etc had to and still do employ engravers to do nothing but sign all day!

[David Hier]

I wish you hadn't said that again.  In my opinion a dogmatic attitude doesn't serve discussion, it only causes rifts.

Lets put it another way. Can you think of a good reason for an artist not to sign their work?

Among others, until comparatively recently flexible drives for diamond engraving were quite expensive!  

This is why acid signatures used to be commonly used in the industry. They may not be added to the glass by the makers own hand, but they still serve as a useful way to identify a piece of glass.

[Frank]

The only time that I made an income from art was in the 1960's, I recently came across the only one of my scupltures that had not sold. I looked for a date on it to remind me when I had been making them... it was unsigned, I presume that I never signed any of them. Too long ago to remember if that had been a conscious decision or if I just did not consider it. If I look at my current collection, nearly all of the paintings are signed but virtually none of the sculptures bear a signature or any other mark. Amongst my modern glass I find that some is signed, diamond point, and others not. Patrick Stern - unsigned, Siddy Langley (art piece not bread and butter) - unsigned, Lindean Mill, all signed and dated but with Lindean mill not Kaplan and Sandström. Of the utility glass, mostly is decorated by Pirelli and bears their label but no indication of who made the glass. At least one container I suspect to be British made and has mould numbers on, some of the other glassware is possibly French. Nearly all of the remaining Scottish glass is unmarked.

Adam what is the cost benefit of sand-blasting over acid etching. Stuarts mostly used sand blasting with a stencil in the Modern period at least.

The use of glass enamel inkjet printing will offer much more potential for fully documenting a piece of glass during manufacture, as David asks. Relatively new technology, it can already be used to put several lines of text onto uneven glass at between 100 and 200 items per minute.

Another reason that has not been mentioned yet is size. Much Strathearn glassware under 4" was unmarked despite their policy of marking all glass. It was labelled though.

[Leni]

Following my response on the thread "Franco Moretti 'Love Birds' Signed to Base" on the Morano board, I received an email from Yvonne Moretti, in which she said, "My father only signed and/or dated his personal collection; very rarely did he sign production items.  Small animals and such were not signed."  

HTH

[aa]

Adam what is the cost benefit of sand-blasting over acid etching. Stuarts mostly used sand blasting with a stencil in the Modern period at least.

I'm not sure about Stuart's but I seem to remember that Wedgwood's method of sandblasting was extremely fast. Guyson International, who are the market leader in sandblasters in the UK developed a system that involved a heavy duty rubber stencil set into an upright sandblasting unit. You placed the object over the stencil and pressed the foot switch. Instant sandblast signature. The unit was set up like a work bench and didn't need a conventional cabinet and dust extractor. It was just for "signing".

Acid etching meant applying an individual mask to each piece, which took time to apply and then clean off. So although the set up costs for the Wedgwood system were high it saved a lot of time.

If any of this stuff is wrong, apologies! I wasn't there and am just going on what I have been told by people who were!

[Frank]

That makes sense then, I was told that Stuarts used that method because of the speed. Now Wedgwood too.

It would be useful to provide some guidelines to enable people to recognise the differences.

Acid etching could also be done with a rubber stamp to but getting the paste to the right consistency to give a clean impression is difficult. I suppose it is also possible to stamp the piece with a resist ink and then brush the paste over.

Lets see how long before we get eBay listings with "sand-blasted" instead of "acid-etched" signature  :lol:

[Sklounion]

Hi,
Clearly there are diverse opinions on this issue.
I think that it was Adam A, who suggested in another thread that Blanka Ademsova, had not personally made a piece of glass, the inference perhaps being given that some-else did the work, and she took the credit. In part, that may be an erroneous perception drawn from a comment from the late and much respected Robert Truitt, that (to paraphrase" few czechoslovakian artists made the glass").

That quite clearly is erroneous, Suhajek, Fisar and Jezek, always clearly as cognisant of the skills, and capable of exhibiting them, as any glass-master assisting should be.

To talk of Ademsova, Novak jnr, etc, is to talk of a training, bearing little relation to western perception. Virtually any candidate to VSUP, was already, by virtue of their training at the glass-schools of Kamenicky Senov, Novy Bor, or Zelezny Brod, a highly skilled and trained artisan.

Thus whether later they chose to design only, or interact in the creation of the piece, many had skills far beyond most western artists.

I suspect, though no doubt I am probably wrong, that Jasper Conran, or John Rocha, have had little or no training, in what is a complex material to work with. I suspect that designs have merely been passed to the glass-masters.
Thus any glass bearing such a tag /acid-etched mark, sand-blast motif, has what, if any, value?
It is no indicator of anything, beyond an un-acknowledged glass-masters ability to produce an item, bearing a desirable name.

Once the plastic or paper label has disappeared, does it matter?

A glass-master may be able to say.....

regards,

Marcus

[Bernard C]

Signed pressed glass is unusual.   Glen has made some comments in this topic about signed Carnival glass.

A query by new member izwizz highlights another example of signed pressed glass.   Early examples of Jobling Opalique from late 1933 on were signed "Joblings Opalique", all in the same hand.    Other inscriptions in the same hand on this range include "REGN APPD FOR" and "RD No ...", applied to early examples before the registration number was punched into the mould.

Bernard C.  

[aa]

Hi,
Clearly there are diverse opinions on this issue.
I think that it was Adam A, who suggested in another thread that Blanka Ademsova, had not personally made a piece of glass, the inference perhaps being given that some-else did the work, and she took the credit.

In this context I was talking about her hot glass pieces as opposed to her cast pieces.I wasn't in any way suggesting that the work was not valid. Far from it. I think her work is phenomenal.

In part, that may be an erroneous perception drawn from a comment from the late and much respected Robert Truitt, that (to paraphrase" few czechoslovakian artists made the glass").

That quite clearly is erroneous, Suhajek, Fisar and Jezek, always clearly as cognisant of the skills, and capable of exhibiting them, as any glass-master assisting should be.

Yes, but perhaps these are exceptions that proved the rule:after all  Suhajek came to the UK and studied at the RCA to because at that time there were no facilities within the Czech system for glass-blowers to become artists in hot (blown) glass. It was easier for artists to do cold work and casting. This meant that Novak and  Vasicek had their hands on the glass, while Touskova and others who were making fairly monumental pieces had to work with gaffers in a factory, whom they directed.

[/b]

To talk of Ademsova, Novak jnr, etc, is to talk of a training, bearing little relation to western perception. Virtually any candidate to VSUP, was already, by virtue of their training at the glass-schools of Kamenicky Senov, Novy Bor, or Zelezny Brod, a highly skilled and trained artisan.

Thus whether later they chose to design only, or interact in the creation of the piece, many had skills far beyond most western artists.

I suspect, though no doubt I am probably wrong, that Jasper Conran, or John Rocha, have had little or no training, in what is a complex material to work with. I suspect that designs have merely been passed to the glass-masters.

Fair enough, but Rocha and Conran are trained and acknowledged "masters" in another discipline,  and they bring an understanding of design to glass that has a different perspective. Conran's stems for Stuart have caught the public's attention and made cut glass 'fashionable' for the first time in years. is that such a bad thing and why should we not give him credit.

Are we in danger of saying that an architect should not be credited with the design of a building but that we shoud be more interested in the bricklayer?