Vase

The round, joint foot rises conically in the middle it supports a node, which holds the bullet-shaped body, which is faceted into seventeen sides. The neck has fourteen faceted sides and ends in a jointed, splaying top rim. The foot and the two borders of the neck are decorated with a frieze of hearts, painted in high, white enamel. The node shows a blue string of beads, enriched with white granules and enframed with gold. The stem and the bottom of the body are decorated with a scratched and gilt row of leaves. The neck is painted with a flowery frieze constructed of confronting volute pairs, gilt and painted in white enamel. The smooth top part of the body is decorated with a shell-shaped vase, flanked by a white horse with swan wings and fish tails on both sides, enclosed by flowery tendrils with gilt and green acanthus leaves. The confronting side is painted in white enamel and gilt with an eight-petalled rosette the edges of the faceted sides and the junctures of the parts are emphasized with lines and rows of spots, with high gilding. The relief gilding is worn at places, revealing the sky-blue high enamel from beneath. The shaping of the object follows classical urns. The extremely rich decoration tends towards oriental historisation realized at a high level of technical knowledge. Identical ornaments can be found on another hyalite glass vase in the collection of the Budapest Museum of Applied Arts, also purchased at the 1873 Viennese world exhibition (Inv.No. 9665 a- b), and similar motifs with identical technique on the bottom of a hyalite glass lamp (Inv.No. 890). Mrs. Klára Tasnádi-Marik identified this vase as a Russian glass, on the basis of the technique of enamel painting. In the "old inventory book" of the Budapest Museum of Applied Arts this object was registered as a Lobmeyr glass. However, knowing the glasses of the Schreiber &Neffen and the J. &L. Lobmeyer company, and looking at the technical realization of the vase, it can be, with reason, regarded to be a product of the Schreiber &Neffen company, made for the 1873 Vienna world exhibition.