Posted 8 years ago
IronLace
(929 items)
I bought this unusual piece around 14 years ago...at the time, it was mounted on a wooden base, & was sold as a Murano fish figurine. However, there were various aspects that never added up to it being Murano, especially the metal fitting on the base, the rustic thorns on the fish, & the amount of ingrained black dirt in the applied decoration, which strongly suggested a Victorian era piece. Murano fish figurines are smooth & simpler in form, & do not have the rustic thorns. I also knew immediately that the wooden base was incorrect, & eventually deduced that it would have sat on a mirror plateau, after I acquired another Victorian piece on a mirror base, which had an identical metal fitting. After much searching, I finally found an appropriate mirror plateau last year, which I feel is of the correct size for the vase...the screw in fitting was a perfect match for it. The reason for my tentative attribution to John Walsh Walsh is due to the similarity between this fish & the vases they made with applied fish, as well as the rustic thorn pull out decoration, & the distinctive bright pink, which is seen on their Palm Tree vases. The vase alone measures 24 cm tall (27 cm including the mirror plateau). It measures 12 cm wide across the mouth of the fish. Made from three layers of cased glass - clear over bright pink, with a white interior, it is decorated with rustic thorns & has applied details in clear glass. A small clear rigaree encircles the base near the metal fitting.
Many thanks, czechglass5, I am not sure about the use of this item, typically the pieces mounted on mirror plateaux were either epergnes, fairy lamps (& fairy lamp/epergne hybrids) or rose bowls. This piece, being quite large, could have been a table centerpiece. The other item I have on a mirror base is a small, satin glass rose bowl, which I also think might be a Walsh Walsh product. It took me 13 years to find a spare mirror plateau - & funnily enough, I found two at the same time at an antiques fair. So I have another spare in a smaller size which would be appropriate for a rose bowl or small vase. Since so much Victorian glass ends up as orphan odds & ends, I have no doubt that I'll end up finding a spare to match it one day!
Very eye catching and in some ways reminiscent of Victorian thorn vases. Is this where the curled up ends of some thorn vases come from. Or did fish with thorns come from thorn vases.
Many thanks sklo42, & what an intriguing conundrum you've proposed - rather like the chicken & the egg...I am not sure if thorn vases inspired thorny glass fish, or vice versa. I will simply put it down to the Victorian exuberance for slathering on as much decoration as possible, & also their taste for the grotesque! :-)
Smaller versions of the same curious type of fish are seen applied on documented vases by Walsh Walsh.