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Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass Paperweights => Topic started by: SimonD on January 24, 2012, 08:18:44 PM

Title: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: SimonD on January 24, 2012, 08:18:44 PM
I've had this glass plaque for some years now, but have seen nothing quite like it except in some books. Thought to get people's opinions of it - age, function (is it a paperweight), country of origin, etc.

At first sight it looks like a oblong of polished rock bristling with fossils. But on closer inspection you'll see that it is made of glass which has swirls of chestnut and aventurine with embedded millefiori. As the canes are mostly on one side, it would appear they were picked up on a gather and pressed into a slab or mold, then later polished. It measures approx 3 inched x 2 inches x 0.5 inches.

Surely someone out there has something similar in their collection?
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: alexander on January 25, 2012, 10:24:07 AM
I think this is Murano (or less likely Bohemian), it's hard to tell without seeing the canes clearer.

I'm at a loss to age but would not be surprised if it was 19th or early 20th C.
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: SimonD on January 25, 2012, 11:17:50 AM
Alexander - it's really hard to see the canes in this plaque because they are set in an opaque glass matrix which has been subsequently polished. They appear as a transection or slice through the cane.

I've included a close up which shows the cog claim, plus the other type. This second type appears as a milky white tube (with a clear glass centre) surrounded by a striped ring (with longitudinal bands in white, red and black) set concentrically a little further out (separated by clear glass). The closeup photo shows a couple of these canes in cross-section, and a nice example of one set obliquely where you can see both the milky core and outer stripes.
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: alexander on January 25, 2012, 01:28:13 PM
Thanks for the closeup, I think 19th C Murano rather than 20th but I could be wrong.
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: SimonD on January 25, 2012, 07:00:31 PM
Perhaps a little earlier...

Take a look at the article "Silesian Heritage - New Clues in the Paperweight World" written by Marek Kordasiewicz that appeared in the 2004 Annual Bulletin of the  Paperweight Collectors Association. On page 33 of the Bulletin there is an early photo of glass items that contains some very similar plaques:

Quote
A never before published photograph, taken in the first half of the nineteenth century, shows what is believed to be von Minutoli's collection of millefiori and mosaic glass objects, some of them made BC, others in the sixteenth century.
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: flying free on January 25, 2012, 10:03:18 PM
I'll qualify this by saying I know nothing about paperweights and have never seen anything like this before, but when I saw it it reminded me of my V Nason pieces for some reason.  They don't have canes in and are just aventurine but something about the shape the solidity of the glass, the use density of the glass, reminded me of V Nason.   I know...I'm probably centuries out or at least decades (my pieces being 1970's production)  ;D But I wonder if these are where V Nason got their inspiration perhaps?
It's a gorgeous piece of glass :)
m
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: w8happiness on March 04, 2013, 09:31:47 AM
Hello Simon,
you have replied in the lily-of-the-valley case, and via the Apsley Pellatt thread I have found, that the fascinating Venezian plaque is your's!
I always wanted to know more about this piece, and bought a round aventurine weight in Germany a couple of years ago; as far as I can see, it has a related cane type (three times) enclosed. It is not signed, but it may be a piece that was sold along a Trade Exhibition in the 1840/1850ies; (Bigaglia - in 1845 in Vienna, first time, then he was attending many Fairs, even at the 1851 WTF in GB...and hopefully sold a lot of what he brought with him!)  The type of square paperweights surely has a very long tradition, more of them were made in marble or micro mosaic, and in Russia as square flat bouquets- the most expensive weight one could find! The micro mosaics were an Italian souvenir top-seller and possibly a millefiori predecessor...
The blue-red-white cane was surely inspired by a famous and traditional bead design called chevron bead, which can be found a long time back in history...
kind regards, Erhard
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: chopin-liszt on March 04, 2013, 01:40:08 PM
No idea as to maker - but could it be for jewellery? A cabochon for a belt or brooch.
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: w8happiness on March 04, 2013, 02:20:00 PM
Hello Simon,
you have replied in the lily-of-the-valley case, and via the Apsley Pellatt thread I have found, that the fascinating Venezian plaque is your's!
I always wanted to know more about this piece, and bought a round aventurine weight in Germany a couple of years ago; as far as I can see, it has a related cane type (three times) enclosed. It is not signed, but it may be a piece that was sold along a Trade Exhibition in the 1840/1850ies; (Bigaglia - in 1845 in Vienna, first time, then he was attending many Fairs, even at the 1851 WTF in GB...and hopefully sold a lot of what he brought with him!)  The type of square paperweights surely has a very long tradition, more of them were made in marble or micro mosaic, and in Russia as square flat bouquets- the most expensive weight one could find! The micro mosaics were an Italian souvenir top-seller and possibly a millefiori predecessor...
The blue-red-white cane was surely inspired by a famous and traditional bead design called chevron bead, which can be found a long time back in history...
kind regards, Erhard
- of course I must add, I agree with Marek Kordasiewicz's opinion, who published an essay -see link- and picture of the plaque, that it could possibly be MUCH earlier, and from Florence, as the comparable piece from Jelenia Gora Museum, http://www.paperweights.pl/Bohemian-draft.pdf - The mentioned chevron bead is also called "rosetta cane"... about the function, there's no way but speculate...
Title: Re: Curious Glass Plaque
Post by: keziaB on April 07, 2016, 07:29:27 PM

Hello Simon,
I was very interested to see your glass plaque, I have a very similar one I bought a few years ago from a antique fair.
I have read the article in the PCA Bulletin but so far have not been able to find any more information about them.
Regards Kezia