Glass Message Board
Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass => Topic started by: obscurities on April 03, 2011, 07:27:41 PM
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I will start by saying this looks like it will glow under black light.... but I am sorry to tell Christine it does not....... :cry:
The piece measures 5 inches in diameter and 1.25 inches tall.
Looking for suggestions as to who made it... Very well executed.
TIA Craig
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Hi Craig:
Nice bowl. These are really hard to pin down (npi), as quite few makers, both well-known and obscure, did this type of design. I was going to say I'd call this 'a canne' or even 'mezza filigrana' as I tend to associate pinwheel with Fratelli Toso, but, actually looking at the piece, it is a pinwheel. Any idea where the term pinwheel came from? It's not a translation of anything Italian, I don't think.
David
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David, I believe the term originates from an old style toy , where a spinning surface was suspended from a pin on a stick. The shape of the object would allow for it to spin if moved through the air, or also if held in the wind. The patterns on the toy would seem to form a spiraling, or pinwheel pattern...... Later the term was applied to spinning discs with patterns that would be driven by a small motor, and the pattern on the flat surface would appear to look, in some cases, like the pattern in this glass... a circular type of pattern, seeming to emit a circular or spinning motion......
I hope that makes sense.....
Here is a Google search for:
Pinwheels
(http://www.google.com/images?q=pinwheel&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&biw=1308&bih=869)
Craig
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Craig:
Thanks for taking the trouble to explain. My bigger question is who applied the term to glass, and is it a Murano term? Just one of many idiosyncrasies, a preoccupation with terminology. I should just appreciate your bowl.
David
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That I do not know.... maybe the Italians invented the pinwheel..... ;D
I suppose it is also possible and more likely that it is a term applied by the English speaking world due to the appearance of some pieces....
It is better, and fancier, than just calling calling it spiral.....
Craig
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I have a question please? How is it known that this is Italian? I'm just trying to learn something and having been through pages and pages of Clichy it struck me how there are similarities between some of those pieces and others that we see on the board. I appreciate the colours may be a deciding factor here and possibly never produced by Clichy for example or elsewhere other than Italy. Sorry :-[.... I'm probably the only one who can't just see that this is Italian and couldn't possibly have originated elsewhere, but I'm just trying to learn a bit.
m
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The color combination is the biggest pointer..... I would certainly be open to info pointing somewhere other than Italy for this piece.... but I do not think it will be forthcoming....
Thoughts anyone??
Craig
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Thoughts anyone??
yeah lots. One predominant though: it is as Italian as it gets. Everything just screams Murano - the slightness, the balance, the elegance and the colour combo. If you say Toso, or Salviati, or Barovier I'd have to agree - without further specifics, as I have no idea who made it. :pb:
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couldn't possibly have originated elsewhere
Agreed with Ivo. Is it in any possible that it could be made elsewhere? Well, yes. For example, I've seen reticello ( a typically Murano technique) made recently in the USA that is as fine as any of the reticello I have from Murano. However, the US reticello piece was signed and cost over $2,000 and none of my pieces cost over $100.
It's much easier to copy some of the other Murano techniques, such as sommerso.
There's also scale, which Ivo might be covering by using "slightness." This is not a big piece, which more modern copies tend to be.
M: Do you have a link to a Clichy piece that is similar to this piece? It might be interesting to compare the pieces if you do, and Craig doesn't mind a little detour for his thread.
David
PS After posting this, I read another thread "Latticino from St Louis or Murano" and I understand flying frees question more clearly now.
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Hi all, thanks for sharing your thoughts. I suppose it's because I have very little antique glass and certainly because I have handled so little glass really, that I'm interested to know what the instinctive reaction is to a piece and where one would set about a first search. I guess it's no different to me recognising more contemporary pieces now I've seen a lot more - and remembering how when I first started collecting glass I really hadn't any clue at all. And I did manage to find my Clichy jug within about an hour of looking so I suppose my own 'instinct' is improving.
Also, I have a huge passion for intricate glass, glass that 'does' something rather than plain clear glass. As time's gone on and I research more, I see some wonderful antique or 'older' glass that I'd really like to own (wouldn't we all ;D) and also I'm in awe that such amazing glass was being produced so many years ago. I have a book that I particularly love called Glass by George Savage and perhaps my question stems slightly from that as well. On page 13 there is a vase entitled 'Tazza from Millefiore glass. Probably Alexandrian. First Century AD' and another 'Bowl of 'gold sandwich' glass. Syrian. Second to Third century AD' - I swear you'd think they were made, if not yesterday, certainly this century. They are truly amazing. So I suppose my curiosity is there because of this. David the link for the Clichy pieces is here - there are many to trawl through and some amazingly beautiful glass - I hope this link works and sorry it is so long :-[
m
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=KEYMY4_ytuUC&pg=PA151&lpg=PA151&dq=verre+de+clichy&source=bl&ots=pTmKnlGQ_l&sig=U5nlRJvhijH5JRqEhw9KHJQHC0g&hl=en&ei=mZadTeGyDomDhQeV-PWtBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CF8Q6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=verre%20de%20clichy&f=false
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Thanks for the link, Flying Free, and I understand the connection to Clichy much better now. I answered the question in the context in Craig's piece, 1950'-60's, but I think your question goes further back. There was a very good description in the Clichy link of how to produce filigrana and zanfirico rods, two very Murano techniques. The Murano connection seems to be acknowledged in the text.
In another related thread on this topic, someone mentioned that Venetian Glass was produced by Jenkinson's of Norton Park in Edinburgh, the company that would become Edinburgh and Leith Crystal. I have a piece of that passed down from a relative. The piece was most likely created by the Venetian glassblowers that Jenkinson's imported to Scotland. (It must have been the climate and the food that attracted them. ) So that even when very Murano techniques are used, the glass may not come from Murano, which I think is your point.
I've found the same as you the short time I've been collecting. When I started collecting, I saw all glass in very discrete, separate categories. But the more glass I saw and handled, the more I read about glass and how it was made, the more I saw connections, influences, and homages in every piece. I remember being in the museum in Murano and seeing ancient glass for the first time and thinking how modern they looked. It was the same with seeing Marinot pieces from before WWII in France and seeing how Scandinavian they looked. I've become better at saying what a piece is likely to be, but no more than that. I think I can identify many complete impostors, but I'm not going to reach the level of someone like Ivo who can make the fine distinctions between similar pieces of glass.
One of the funny things I've noticed, though, is that the better I've become at id'ing a piece, the less I care about where it comes from, at least for the pieces I really like.
David
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And here is David's lovely Jenkinson piece (https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/_nTna9jWUu4A/TEj1BNTEbYI/AAAAAAAAA2M/uBELerlxHP8/s512/IMG_0673.JPG) , which also stars in Scotland's Glass.