Bottle ID: 00646

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GREEN, ELONGATED OCTAGONAL W/FACETED RAISED PANELS

Date: 1750-1820

Height: 71 mm

Glass, of flattened, elongated octagonal faceted form, tapering towards the foot, with multi-faceted raised panels surrounding a central raised elongated faceted panel on the front and reverse, of a semi-opaque emerald-green.

Possibly Imperial, attributed to the Palace Workshops, Beijing.

Similar Examples:

Moss, Hugh, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang.  A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles - The Mary and George Bloch Collection, 2002, Vol. 5, Part 2, pp. 290-291, no. 789.

Provenance:

Hugh Moss [HK] Ltd.
Guwan cheng, Beijing, April 2005

Exhibited:

Annual Convention ICSBS Toronto, October 2007

It was not only in manufacturing techniques and decoration that European art and culture influenced Chinese art from the eighteenth century onwards.  This glass bottle shows distinct stylistic Western faceting.  While its form is clearly influenced by, in particular, the Swiss and French, the technique of faceting is clearly Chinese.  The bottle would have been mold-blown, then cut and polished using techniques similar to jade carving of the time.  In Europe, facet cutting was undertaken with the intention of displaying a stone's brilliance, usually a gem-stone.  This does not appear to be the case for the Chinese, as the technique was used not only on glass, but also on jade which is opaque.

As the eighteenth century progressed, the small finely made examples became less acutely angled and by the nineteenth century bigger in size.

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