Condition
Pastiche. Seams are concealed by weathering that has caused some discoloration, especially around the body of the animal.
Description
Pastiche. Statuette of a quadruped animal, probably a bull. A large part of the conical body is made of dark green glass around which is wound in spirals a wide off-white band that was then dragged, forming a feathered motif. The applied legs are made of dark blue glass with red striations. Only a tiny part of the original animal’s head is preserved, hidden almost entirely in the new head; original head was smaller and was bent toward the ground, which might indicate that it had horns, presented in a charging pose. The neck was also smaller than the current one. The head, legs, and tail are applied. The head is made of a greenish, bubbly resin, and the ears, eyes, nostrils, and mouth are rendered with red resin, imitating glass. Red and black resin is used for the rear part of the body, lower part of the legs, tail, and the drum that connects the animal to its circular base. In all four legs the lump attached to the body belongs to the original object, made of very dark blue glass with opaque red striations, and the lower part of the legs is modern filling. The base comprises a discoid core of dark green glass, different from the body; it is possible that it is the rim of a flask and that the glass in the bottom was added from another vessel.
Comments and Comparanda
The shape and the decoration of the original part of the body are very similar to bird-like Islamic flasks: Jenkins, Marilyn. 1986. “Islamic Glass. A Brief History.” Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 44: 1–56., p. 11, no. 2 and Carboni, Stefano. 2001. Glass from Islamic Lands: The Al-Sabah Collection. London: Thames & Hudson., pp. 302–303, no. 79, with bibliography; Whitehouse, David B. 2014. Islamic Glass in the Corning Museum of Glass, vol. 2. Corning, NY: Corning Museum of Glass., p. 218, no. 992. Further published examples of bird-like Islamic flasks include the following: Billups collection B271A: A Decade of Glass Collection: Selections from the Melvin Billups Collection, exh. cat. 1962. Corning, NY: Corning Museum of Glass., p. 22, no. 28; Lamm, Carl Johan. 1930. Mittelalterliche Gläser und Steinschnittarbeiten aus dem Nahen Osten, I–II. Forschungen zur islamischen Kunst 5. Berlin: D. Reimer., vol. 1, p. 103, no. 9, and v. 2, plate 32.9; Clairmont, Christoph W. 1977. Catalogue of Ancient and Islamic Glass. Athens: Benaki Museum., p. 137, nos. 502 and 503; Riis, Poul Jorden. 1957. “Les verreries.” In Poul Jorden Riis and Vagn Poulsen, Hama: Fouilles et recherches de la fondation Carlsberg, 1931–1938, vol. IV. 2: Les verreries et poteries médiévales, 30–116. Copenhagen: Nationalmuseet., p. 62, fig. 181, and pp. 67–68, fig. 203, excavated at Hama, Syria; Wightman, G. J. 1989. The Damascus Gate, Jerusalem. BAR International Series 519. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports., plate 72:5, excavated in Jerusalem; Scanlon, George T., and Ralph H. Pinder-Wilson. 2001. Fustat Glass of the Early Islamic Period: Finds Excavated by the American Research Center in Egypt, 1964–1980. London: Altajir World of Islam Trust., p. 108, type 44e, excavated at Fustat.
Provenance
By 1974–1988, Erwin Oppenländer, 1901–1988 (Waiblingen, Germany), by inheritance to his son, Gert Oppenländer, 1988; 1988–2003, Gert Oppenländer (Waiblingen, Germany), sold to the J. Paul Getty Museum, 2003
Bibliography
Saldern von, Axel, Birgit Nolte, Peter La Baume, and Thea Elisabeth Haevernick. 1974. Gläser der Antike. Sammlung Erwin Oppenländer. Mainz: von Zabern., p. 253, no. 742.
Exhibitions
Gläser der Antike: Sammlung Erwin Oppenländer (Hamburg and Cologne, 1974–1975)