ARCHIVED Questions and Answers
Galle'n Lamp (France)
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Galle'n Lamp by Ed Baquerizo - San Francisco
Posted: October 03, 1998 @ 12:35.
I just returned from a trip to Europe. In Vienna, I purchased an all-glass lamp at a flea market (about one foot high, yellowish color with blue leaves) that has the word "Gallen" (accent mark on "e") on both the glass shade and on the base. Do you know anything about this lamp maker? There was also a small vase by the same maker. Any information you provide will be appreciated. Please let me know if you know where I can find more information. Thanks, Ed Baquerizo
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On October 03, 1998 @ 19:10, Fil Graff, Guild Secretary
wrote:
Ed: I'm guessing the mark is "Galle", rather than "Gallen". Galle is/was a famous French glass maker. I'll flag your message to M. Ara's (in Paris) attention. :: Fil ::
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On October 06, 1998 @ 20:28, M. Ara, Paris
wrote:
Gallé (I hope you see on your screen the "e" with an accent) is one of the most outstanding glass manufacturers of the Art Nouveau period in France. Emile Gallé was born in Nancy (Lorraine) in 1846 and died there in 1904. There are whole books on the subject, but to make it short, you must know that he first studied philosophy and botanics, then took over the family glass and ceramics plant and put into application the theories he developed in his lab from 1867 on: new glass blowing techniques, especially decoration by overlay (each layer having a different color, then acid-etched obtaining a cameo-pattern). Gallé produced many poetic glass objects, vases, lamps etc. that can reach today prices over a million francs (170,000 $), but these rare works have been made by hand by his skilled workers before Gallé's death, glass inlay, gold or platinum inlay, hand-etched poetic inscriptions.... After 1904, many serial products, probably like your lamp, too, were produced, mainly in the 1920's, and these are not interesting for museum curators, even if they can also reach high prices, especially large lamps (over 50 or 60 cm. high). Many copies have been made in Romania in the last 20 years, very good copies, very bad for the collector, yet beautiful. Three things not to forget about Gallé: 1) he did not make his glass parts himself, he just designed, his workers produced; 2) many books and antique dealers talk about "pate-de-verre" produced by Gallé. Gallé never produced pate-de-verre, only blown glass and chrystal (pate-de-verre is made like a cake, glass powder being the "flour" and metal oxides "the cocoa"). 3) most of the popular literature on Art Nouveau glass dates the serial production of the post-1904 era from the "turn of the century". This is not correct, the original archives of the Gallé manufacture are conserved in the Musée d'Orsay in Paris (the Museum of the 19th Century), and they tell us much truth about Gallé. Ciao! Ara