vase BM-1873-1215.1

Period:Qing dynasty Production date:1723-1735
Materials:glass
Technique:blown

Dimensions:Diameter: 10.90 centimetres Height: 10.70 centimetres

Description:
Vase. Made of opaque yellow glass.
IMG


Comments:Rawson 1992:In the Qing dynasty, under Emperor Kangxi (1662-1722), a glasshouse was set up in 1696 within the Imperial Workshop in the Forbidden City in Beijing. This greatly increased the status of glass and resulted in a flourishing of glass production. The glasshouse was supervised by a German Jesuit called Stumpf, and glass produced during the first half of the eighteenth century seems to have suffered from the same defect as much Western glass of that period – crizzling. This is a gradual cracking and flaking in a web-like structure caused by an excess of alkali (too much soda and too little lime). Although the Western supervisors influenced the technology of glass making, they were not to be responsible for any great changes in the style of glass vessels. The shapes produced were undoubtedly Chinese, often reflecting those of ceramic, lacquer, jade and bronze vessels. The vessels were decorated in a variety of techniques such as moulding, incising, carving, diamond-point engraving, overlay (or cameo glass) and enamelling; Glass was also made to imitate realgar and aventurine, lapis lazuli, turquoise and jasper, just as it had been in earlier times, as a cheap substitute for jade.