Topic: whopper vase

[Ivo]

This 33 cm (13") vase is heavy and has tons of wear on the underside. No pontil mark - the thing was made in a whopper mould. The top is cut and polished finely - not course as in contemporary pieces. So my idea is that it was made some time in the thirties to sixties.
The basic colour of the glass is light green - and the red is etched on. The (copper??) etch is sponged on in a gradation, so at the lower end of the colour you can see streaks, while the colour is solid towards the top.  Some of the etching has disappeared, so there are a few mottled patches.
Can anyone remember seeing this technique before. Does anyone think this is from Belgium or do we think it is German or Bohemian?
Thank you for looking.

[paradisetrader]

Ivo said "the red is etched on"

Like the Muranese Incisio technique? viz engraved lines closely spaced sprialling around the body of the vessel. Or Velato; grinding to a soft velvety finish ?

I find the idea of the colour being sponged on, difficult to grab hold of.
It's definitely not a thin overlay carefully ground back to produced the graduated effect ?
The streakyness could have come over time perhaps, with handling causing minute flecks to fall away. Just a thought.
Pete

[Ivo]

Hi Pete long time no see. This is clearly a case of sponged on and fired, I think it is copper flashing but I've never seen it applied like this. It is clearly on the outside - in the thicker parts where it did not fix there is a clear crater of 1mm x 1mm deep, and lower down where it did not fix itself to the glass it has a watery effect. The green also has a weird surface with tiny panther spot microblisters - see photograph.

[paradisetrader]

ok Reading back I realise that my 3rd suggestion (flash then grind*) would have left it satiny, rather than clear, in any case.

1mm is actually a rather deep cut. The other 1mm is the distance to the next cut ? Or you can't tell because it's all covered in this copper flashing ?

Copper > as in the colour ? The chemical composition (ie copper in the glass ?) ? Both ?
I haven't come across use of the term or that colour glass before.

panther spots > some kind of acid treatment ?

The whole thing is most odd.

The obvious question to ask is why not blow with 2 colours ? I'm guessing because they didn't have the personel with that skill level or they had already converted to semi ? automatic systems and likely both.

So, a glass factory with spare-capacity in sophisticated blow-molded technology which they wanted to make look like hand-blown art-glass. Maybe a factory whose bred-and-butter business was glass packaging ?
That's the best I can come up with
Pete

* Yes we know it sounds naughty

[Ivo]

The whole thing is most odd.

I'm the first to agree with you for the full 100%.

[krsilber]

The basic colour of the glass is light green - and the red is etched on. The (copper??) etch is sponged on in a gradation, so at the lower end of the colour you can see streaks, while the colour is solid towards the top.

I'm unclear about your use of the word "etch" here.  Is the glass etched where the color has come off?

Is the glass green where the red has come off?  Seems like transparent red over green would make brown, but maybe the green isn't very strong.

The microblisters look to me like they could have been the result of popped bubbles of whatever the coloring material is.  Are you sure it's fired on?  I thought fired on color usually fades more than flakes. 

"Flashing" as I learned it means a hot process, one of dipping a piece in thin liquid glass...is this yet another word with various meanings?

Interesting piece (and what a whopper)!  It would be nice to know how it was done.