Glass Sgraffito?

Sometimes a piece of glass will pursue you. A few months ago, with a few friends, I was in a small Prague antique shop and saw a wonderful rare Heinrich Hussmann Moser bowl. The guy owning the shop was wonderful, but the price was way too high –I had to sadly leave it behind. So I was even more surprised to see this beauty at a recent Birmingham, UK show. Zooming in on it, I mentioned to its seller that the only time I’d seen a good one like it before was in Prague. ‘Oh’ says the guy ‘it’s the same piece; I often lend him pieces, but he puts such a big mark up on them’. After a reasonable negotiation I got it for around 1/3 the price it was in the Prague shop. So now I’m happy!

Pic 1 we have this great deep acid etched Heinrich Hussman designed 1927 Moser bowl, it’s shown in Jan Mergl and Lenka Pakova’s great Moser book, p103. To quote them ‘... thick walled simply shaped massive vessels adorned with rough and deep acid etched decoration with animals or floral motifs... The final appearance resembles Sgraffito’.

Pic 2 is its standard Moser signature.

Pic 3 is its rare Heinrich Hussmann 4H signature, I believe this means he actually made this example.

Pic 4 –as I have room- is my slight mystery piece, another deep etched Moser bowl very much in this Hussman style, but effectively cameo as it’s two layers, a purple to clear layer over the green layer and then gilded. This one has two cameo Moser signatures, but I can’t find a similar example documented anywhere.

Enjoy!