Glass Message Board
Glass Discussion & Research. NO IDENTIFICATION REQUESTS here please. => Malta Glass => Topic started by: Scott13 on June 25, 2018, 05:50:34 AM
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Hi,
Any idea how old this bowl might be?
Its polished base has a lot of wear.
It’s also seriously heavy!
Has the early Mdina colours.
Would like to think it might have been made during Michael Harris’s tenure - ‘ chance would be a fine
thing ‘ !
Diam 14cm (5.5”)
Ht 8.5cm (just over 3”)
Wt. 1692gm
Any thoughts? :)
Scott
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Yes, it's Mdina. It's early 70s (descrribed in an early 70s Dexam catalogue as a sweet dish) but possibly not during Michael Harris's time
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Hi Christine,
Many thanks :)
Scott
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But some of them just might be. ;)
He did take this thick form of bowl on to IoWSG, although not for many bits. I've got a small Aurene one, and thick bowls can be found from the early experimental trial ranges with wispy swirly trails of colour in; some ended up in small lollipops and pwts too. Later on, there were thick pin dishes made in the "petit fleur" pattern.
They come in a deep form like this one, and a bit flatter.
And I really, really like them. They're wonderfully tactile.
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Hi Sue,
Yes, very touchable - I just have to make sure I don’t drop it, or it could mean a visit to the A & E !
I’ve been looking at some earlier Mdina posts - interesting discussions on the usage of Cobalt Blue ( and Amethyst) as final colours on the really early pieces...............
Thanks for the info :)
Scott
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Hi,
I’m trying to get my head round the Mdina colours ( could be useful in the future ) particularly the
blues and especially cobalt blue, as apparently it can be used as a marker for the early bits
( 68 - early 70s ).
There are essentially two blues in this bowl, a blue/green, of which there’s quite a lot; but there are also swirls of a darker blue - could this be cobalt blue?
The photo was taken in bright daylight- not difficult to find at the moment !
Hope the image helps and you can see what I mean. :)
Scott
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The bowl is mostly clear glass. It's just a small amount of standard blue and the thickness and the silver chloride making the different shades
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The "common knowledge" is that there was only ever one pot of cobalt blue melted, and that was very early on, '69-'70-ish possibly but we don't know for sure. It was while Michael Harris was there. He used a lot of it up.
The exact shade of blue or teal used depended on the batch at the time. Some are darker and deeper than others.
But none of those are the cobalt blue.
It's easy to see the difference in reality. Photographs, however, are useless at picking up the difference between cobalt blue and deep teal in Mdina.
We have tried and tried and tried to show the difference in photos. We do know we cannot do it. ::)
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Hi Christine and Sue
Holding the bowl up to the sunlight, I can see most of it is a teal blue but the swirls look as if they’ve
got some purple in them.
Anyway I’m sure Mdina wouldn’t have wasted their precious cobalt blue on a run-of-the-mill bowl like mine !
I’ve always found colours a bit of a nightmare - not helped of course by the fact that we all perceive colours slightly differently.
All part of being human I suppose !
Many thanks for the info :)
Scott
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;D It's not a "run of the mill bowl". It's gorgeous and it is from earlier times. I don't think they were made post-'80s. Each is completely unique.
They didn't know the cobalt pot was unusual, "precious" or scarce.
They had it, they used it up, then went onto using a paler colour. That's all.
Quite possibly nothing more than not having a bit of cobalt to put in at the time, but having something else to hand.
There were no plans. It was a matter of; "Let's see what we can make from what we have handy".
It was possibly just fluke that a bit of cobalt was around in the first place. I don't know where it might have come from. It's not something I tend to keep in my kitchen cupboards. ; ;)
How we percieve colour is unique to each of our individual brains. ;D
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Hi,
I should never have called it run-of-the-mill , I feel guilty now :( , actually I think it’s great - love its weight and its colours, and of course it is so tactile :)
I’ll just have to accept that perhaps I’ve got an underdeveloped colour perceiving brain bit ;D
Scott
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Don't worry, I was teasing!
There are enough of these around for us to know they continued being made after MH left, but they are early, if you consider all of the '70s (and perhaps a little into the '80s) to be early.
Colour is processed seperately from other aspects of vision. And even that is not simple, because your brain has to adjust for the ambient light (that was what made that photo of the black and blue/white and gold dress appear the way it did)
Movement is percieved 200 milliseconds before anything else. (Prof. Zeki.)
In fact, all of vision is broken up into individual component parts before your brain reassembles it into something you can understand, for you. There are bits that process luminance discontinuity, bits that process straight edges, bits that process whether something is in front of, or behind something else - it's incredibly complicated and difficult.
The back of your eyeball is technically part of your brain.
Your perception of colour is not in any way "underdeveloped". It's yours, it works for you and it gives you all the ranges you need.
Just because it might not be on the same scale as somebody else's, doesn't mean you do not have all the same nuances.
It just means we all get in muddles using words to describe it. All of us see things differently. :)
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Hi Sue
Thanks for your dissertation on how we perceive colours - I found it really interesting :)
I now know who I’m going to consult before going to Specsavers ;D
At the risk of being labelled a ‘ heartsink ‘ I’m posting one last photo - purely for show/interest.
Nothing to do with colours, which for very good reasons, I can now see is a lost cause.
Scott
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That looks like a lot of very real age-related wear to me.
And the blue although deep, is still just deep teal, although there was the "jewell-like" later deeper blue Mark mentions, it's very like that, but in the base of your bowl, the colour is just very, very thick.
The exact shade did vary with the batch.
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Hi,
‘Nothing to do with colours, which for very good reasons, I can now see is a lost cause ‘ - only in the sense that its blue isn’t cobalt blue and never will be !
Thought I’d make that clear :)
Scott
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You did. I forgot to add smilies to show that I was teasing a little again. But it's all very clear for anybody elase reading this thread. Thanks, Scott. :)
And athough not neccessarily made in the Harris period, I do consider these to be good early pieces. There is something just absolutely "right" about them.
Mine are at the front of my display shelves. ;D
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Hi,
Yes, there’s something very appealing about it- can’t pin it down, perhaps it’s an example of ‘the whole is greater than the sum of its parts’ - or something like that. ::)
It’s a wonder I haven’t dropped it trying to find the elusive cobalt blue !
Anyway teal is pretty attractive - I’m warming to it - I really am ;)
Thanks to both of you my understanding of colours has definitely gone up a few notches :)
Scott
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;D This probably won't help, ::)
It's an image of a Chinese bowl with both cobalt and teal in.
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Yes, the cb looks to me as if it falls between a royal blue and a navy blue ?
I like it - I don’t know its size - is it a glass tea bowl?
Scott
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Of course I should have asked whether it was a Mdina Chinese tea bowl ;)
Anyway its colour is now etched on my brain - never to be forgotten ;D
Scott
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It's a Mdina "Chinese bowl". That's the official name for these bowls with those three clear looped straps around them.
It's 5.5" diameter and 4.75" tall.
You are correct. The cobalt is a little deeper than royal blue, (more black) but less Quink-y than navy (less purple).
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“You are correct. The cobalt is a little deeper than royal blue, (more black) but less Quink-y than navy (less purple).”
And the cobalt is perhaps a bit more vibrant ?
Thanks for posting the pic :)
Scott
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Thought i could add a picture or two of my bowl which is a similar size maybe not quite as early as the one pictured at the start of this thread, More traditional color's with some nice swirling present the base has been polished flat and is slightly irregular. 13.5 cm x 7.5 cm
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That is fabulous. I'm rather jealous. I wouldn't rule out Harris as the maker. ;)
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:) WOW that's really interesting and good that your impressed by the piece thanks very much for your input once again :)
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There is a lot of rather well executed silver deposit on the outside - along with delicate trails that look a bit like comets.
This was something that originally happened by accident. When the silver salts are heated, they separate from the chloride or nitrate ion and some silver gas gets created in the hot metal. If the hot glass comes away from the iron, some of that gas escapes and gets deposited on the outside of the piece.
Because it was so attractive, they started doing it on purpose - but not everybody there could manage it. Michael Harris could do it really, really nicely and eventually so could Boffo and both Said brothers, (Paul and Joseph) but theirs was often a bit splodgier than Michael's.
I have not yet found out exactly who could do it or who couldn't.
They eventually gave up trying to do it. :)
Incidentally, when you find an electric-blue haze inside a casing on Mdina, that is from silver ions/gas that got distributed throughout the metal. (rather than deposited on the outside.)
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Hi legsy
Great bowl, striking colours - makes mine look positively dull :o :)
Scott