0 - GALLE, Emile (1846–1904)

GALLE, Emile (1846–1904) Ovoid vase with a flared, fluted neck, made of double-layered cream and eggplant-colored glass, decorated with an orchid motif featuring a yellow glass inlay at its center, the entire piece fully ground and set in a chiseled vermeil mount in the Neoclassical style, featuring two musician putti on the shoulders. Signed “Cristallerie GALLE.” Minerva hallmarks. Circa 1894–1897 (Signs of wear). Total height: 16.5 cm This ovoid vase form, featuring the famous orchid motif, demonstrates once again Émile Gallé’s perfect knowledge of the flora of Lorraine. He was, in fact, one of the founding members of the Horticultural Society in 1877. Having settled in La Garenne that same year, his spacious home boasted a vast garden with 2,000 flowers that served as his inspiration. Among them all, Gallé was fascinated by orchids—both the exotic varieties he cultivated in his greenhouses and the native ones. In 1900, he published his research on these flowers, which symbolize complex and mysterious beauty. This vase is also a masterpiece of glass craftsmanship, featuring the finest techniques of hot-enameling and grinding the decoration. A vase with a similar decoration—though unmounted—was recently seen, complete with its base. This reuse was common practice for Gallé, who always produced a small series of vases with the same design; it is said that of the original seven, only two or three were perfectly finished, while the others broke during production. The mounting, for its part, served to highlight the glasswork and, at times, to conceal a flaw or a chip. The mount on our piece is stylistically typical of the pre-Art Nouveau period, drawing on a Neoclassical vocabulary, certainly to incorporate one of his grand designs beloved by Proust and the Goncourt brothers. Not to mention the golden luster of the vermeil, which echoes the Chinese porcelain vases mounted by the great bronze casters under Louis XV.