Glass engravers have been extremely skilled craftsmen and musicians for thousands of years. The 1700s were especially remarkable for their success and popularity.
For instance, this lead glass cup demonstrates how etching incorporated design patterns like Chinese-style concepts right into European glass. It also shows just how the skill of a great engraver can generate imaginary depth and aesthetic appearance.
Dominik Biemann
In the very first quarter of the 19th century the typical refinery area of north Bohemia was the only place where ignorant mythological and allegorical scenes engraved on glass were still in vogue. The cup pictured below was engraved by Dominik Biemann, who concentrated on small pictures on glass and is regarded as one of one of the most important engravers of his time.
He was the boy of a glassworker in Nové Svet and the brother of Franz Pohl, another leading engraver of the duration. His job is characterised by a play of light and shadows, which is especially apparent on this cup presenting the etching of stags in woodland. He was likewise recognized for his work with porcelain. He died in 1857. The MAK Museum in Vienna is home to a big collection of his works.
August Bohm
A remarkable Nurnberg engraver of the late 17th century, Bohm worked with delicacy and a sense of calligraphy. He engraved minute landscapes and engravings with vibrant official scrollwork. His job is a forerunner to the neo-renaissance style that was to control Bohemian and various other European glass in the 1880s and past.
Bohm accepted a sculptural feeling in both relief and intaglio engraving. He displayed his proficiency of the latter in the carefully crosshatched chiaroscuro (stalking) results in this footed cup and cut cover, which shows Alexander the Great at the Fight of Granicus River (334 BC) after a paint by Charles Le Brun. Despite his considerable skill, he never accomplished the popularity and lot of money he looked for. He passed away in scantiness. His wife was Theresia Dittrich.
Carl Gunther
Regardless of his tireless job, Carl Gunther was a relaxed male who enjoyed spending time with family and friends. He liked his daily ritual of visiting the Collinsville Senior Facility to enjoy lunch with his pals, and these minutes of sociability supplied him with a much required break from his demanding profession.
The 1830s saw something quite remarkable happen to glass-- it became colorful. Engravers from Meistersdorf and Steinschonau created highly coloured glass, a preference called Biedermeier, to meet the demand of Europe's country-house classes.
The Flammarion inscription has come to be an icon of this new taste and has appeared in publications dedicated to science as well as those checking out necromancy. It is likewise found in countless gallery collections. It is thought to be the only enduring example of its kind.
Maurice Marinot
Maurice Marinot (1882-1960) started his career as a fauvist painter, yet became attracted with glassmaking in 1911 when going to the Viard siblings' glassworks in Bar-sur-Seine. They offered him a bench and instructed him enamelling and glass blowing, which he understood with supreme ability. He developed his own techniques, using gold streaks and manipulating the bubbles and various other all-natural problems of the product.
His method was to treat the glass as a creature and he was among the first 20th century glassworkers to make use of weight, mass, and the visual effect of all-natural flaws as visual components in his works. The exhibition shows the significant influence that Marinot had on modern glass manufacturing. Sadly, the personalized gift jar Allied bombing of Troyes in 1944 damaged his studio and hundreds of illustrations and paintings.
Edward Michel
In the very early 1800s Joshua introduced a style that resembled the Venetian glass of the duration. He made use of a method called diamond point engraving, which entails scratching lines right into the surface of the glass with a difficult steel implement.
He also established the very first threading maker. This invention permitted the application of long, spirally wound routes of color (called gilding) on the main body of the glass, a vital feature of the glass in the Venetian design.
The late 19th century brought new style concepts to the table. Frederick Kny and William Fritsche both worked at Thomas Webb & Sons, a British firm that focused on high quality crystal glass and speciality coloured glass. Their job reflected a choice for timeless or mythological topics.
