VASE

Between 1877 and 1884

Blown and hot-worked glass, polychrome enameled decoration, gilded highlights

H. 34 cm ; D. 25 cm

Private collection

© Millon & Associés

_

Drouot, Jewelry - Silverware - 20th Century Decorative Arts, Lot 231, Paris, May 3, 2001.

Sotheby's, 20th Century Decorative Arts, Lot 12, Paris, May 24, 2007.

Millon & Associés, Art Nouveau - Art Deco - Design, Lot 18, Paris, December 3, 2015.

_

Vase flat-sided quadripod in the shape of a gourd, in translucent blue blown glass. The base and neck are worked and hot-applied. The vase features a rich polychrome enameled decoration of Japonist inspiration, organized around an aquatic universe populated by flowers and plants, notably water irises, fish, and flying insects. Dragonflies and a hummingbird animate the composition, while numerous gilded highlights emphasize certain elements of the decoration.

The composition is distinguished by a subtle interplay of solids and voids and by the use of reserved motifs, which exploit the translucency of the glass and allow the decoration to extend visually from one side of the belly to the other. On one side, fine circular lines traced in enamel form a concentric movement evoking a swirl on the water's surface, in the center of which a fish appears. The composition thus seems to suggest the movement of a fish leaping out of the water, whose splash impacts the surrounding vegetation.

The hot glasswork fully participates in this aquatic evocation. The blue glass drips on the neck particularly suggest liquid, lending the object an organic and fluid dimension. The color of the glass, the silhouette of the vase, the hot modeling, and the enameled decoration thus respond to each other in a highly coherent composition, where the material itself seems to participate in the depicted subject.

Several vases by Auguste Jean adopt this same form, but each is distinguished by the color of the glass and the composition of its enameled decoration. These variations make each example a truly unique work.