Glass Message Board
Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass => Topic started by: chriscooper on May 26, 2014, 11:03:10 PM
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Not seen this one before 8.5" tall 5" diameter flared rim not sure of the correct description Suzy describes it 'bark' in a cylinder version the only other example I could find in her and Johns albums.
Denver describes it as basket weave. Quite thick glass with lots of bubbles at least one burst.
Weighs a hefty 1.5 kg presume these were blown into a textured mould Whitefriars style? could there be a Boffo influence in the style.
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Notice the odd mark where there is a loss of texture it's not a crack, oval shaped inside the vase a deep ridge can be felt at the bottom inside of the vase but runs out to smooth at the top some sort of tooling mark?
The base is the normal flat ground and polished no Mdina mark.
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The oval looks like a bubble. Maybe a collapsed bubble if you can feel a ridge.
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The shape is unusual, the texture not so much and Boffo didn't invent/discover bark marks
Here'a mine
http://lustrousstone.co.uk/cpg/displayimage.php?pid=1536
This thread is worth a read
http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,29883.10.html
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This finish is different to the bark examples I have. It does look more like a woven basket effect to me than any bark I have seen.
Just personal opinion though and it works for me to differentiate between the styles.
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I have seen Mdina 'bark' style vases before but thought the texture on this seemed different? I don't think it looks the same as the bottle vase in the link or the square ones at all IMHO.
The oval disc (tooling mark) ? in the last photo if it is a bubble if it is it's a big one it's 5" long and 2" wide also a smaller one directly opposite. Could it have been made in a cylinder mould and the flare in the rim pulled out after it came out of the mould maybe and the marks are from holding it with a tool.
Not suggesting Boffo made it or invented the technique indeed a lot of W/f stuff was 'influenced' by the Scandinavians anyway. Though he was skilled enough to make pieces like this so would have maybe brought some ideas with him.
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It's a short/small large textured cylinder vase. ;)
The texture is exactly the same as the normal 8" textured cylider vases that come in blue with silver chloride or in Tortoiseshell, but it's not very bark-y, not in the same way as the other textures, but it's still moulded.
There were a few really big cylinders made, 5" in diameter, but they're normally at least 9" tall, I have one but it's packed away in the attic, I can't remember if it has a flared rim or not - I suspect not.
Flared rims tend to be later...
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It's neither short nor small at over 8.5" and 5" diameter it's green and I will eat my hat if it's later did you read ALL the thread Sue ;D
Chris
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It's short for a 9.5" tall 5" diameter cylinder. A whole inch short. ;D
That's the height of most of these large (5" diameter) cylinders I've seen, the short version is normally 7.5" tall.
It's only green in some places because the silverchloride has turned some clear glass amber over blue.
Mdina did NOT have green glass melted in a pot in the earlier days.
Mark's book does refer to it, but that was before it was discovered that the green things are MDG.
Yes I read all the thread, I do know these pieces quite well.
Flared rims came in after MH left, flared rims are late, as far as I'm concerned. I don't like them.
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It would have been blown in a straight bark mould, which may or may not have been 5 in wide, possibly blown out and then transferred to a pontil rod for cutting and then flaring with callipers. It's not an overly skilful item. The main skill is in getting the silver chloride on nicely before the moulding
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Yes early seems to mean 1968-72 Chris. Especially around here.
Considering the glass works has been going for 46 years that is a strange definition.
Harris period would be a better description than early.
I don't think Chris ever thought it was Harris period more mid 70s which in a 46 year span the first 10 years could fairly be considered early.
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I still think the '80s were just yesterday. ;)
This is probably mid-70s onwards, after Said took over.
There was such a huge change between what was going on before that and the"early period proper", I suppose, which is Harris period.
But Boffo stayed on until '77, and Dobson stayed for a short while too, and Dobson did have artistic input - Tiger is his design, even though he was employed as manager, so there is an "inbetweeny early period", of early - mid-'70s while there were still Boffo and Dobson having an influence.
I really think when folk refer to "Early Mdina" they are referring to Harris period. Things changed too much afterwards to consider them as being in line with the same sorts of work.
I did collect some mid-70s stuff, but I'm very fussy about which sort. I like the Boffo/ Dobson influence still having some sway. I'm not really interested in anything later than that at all.
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I honestly believe that if this site is to continue to be the first port of call for collectors new and old and honest old fashioned dealers just looking for advice too keep things accurate the notion that anything made after 1972 by a company still going in 2014 is 'later' needs to be clarified. Mdina is not just about MH a lot of people who still buy Mdina today have probably not even heard of him and those that have probably remember him more for the stuff he made at Isle of Wight. I was talking to a guy last week who had just 'snaffled' a gorgeous amethyst fish vase dated 1975 and someone sent me a picture today of a couple of the nicest goblets I have ever seen dated 1978 asking he thought Boffo could have made them. Made long after MH had moved on to pastures new but still fantastic pieces of workmanship. I don't talk to people like they know nothing nether do I talk to people assuming they know everything either.
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So in future I will simply say "I do not know" rather than explaining why.
Or simply ignore the post, then get into trouble for saying nothing.
Seems I just can't win. :'(
I share my knowledge. It is not my duty to go and study stuff I'm not interested in in order to accumulate knowledge on it. I'm not any sort of expert, just an enthusiast of Michael Harris' early work.