Images(4)

vase

Object NameCopy of the Portland Vase

Maker Franz Paul Zach

Made FromGlass

Date1862

Techniqueengraved

SizeOverall H: 28 cm

Accession Number92.3.79

Credit LinePurchased with donated funds from the Clara S. Peck Endowment Fund

Curatorial Area(s)

Modern

Exhibitions

Reflecting Antiquity: Modern Glass Inspired by Ancient Rome

Interpretive Notes

Web Text

Zach engraved two almost identical versions of the Portland Vase. (The other one is in the Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter, England.)

Place Made

Europe

Physical DescriptionTranslucent deep blue over colorless; blown, cased; engraved. Jar with two handles. Rim everted, with rounded lip; cylindrical neck curving smoothly out to shoulder, which has rounded profile; body tapers toward bottom; base flat. Handles star at neck with lozenge-shaped plates; vertical ridge on each outer surface, which has seven overlapping V-shaped sections; lower ends attached to blue overlay at shoulder. Body decorated with broad figured frieze extending from level of lower handle attachments almost to lowest surviving part of body and divided into two equal parts (sides I and II) by masks of Pan, which hang by their horns from lower attachments of handles. Each mask has flowing locks, bushy mustache, shaggy beard, eyes with pupils delineated, and open mouth showing teeth. Side I: (A) Naked young man, holding transparent drape in right hand, moves to right in front of two square pillars supporting architrave decorated with dentils and triglyphs, behind which grows small-leaved sapling; his left arm is entwined with right arm of woman (C, below). (B) Eros, holding bow in left hand and torch in his right, flies to right, glancing back to left, ahead of young man. (C) Woman, sitting on low rock with head turned back in profile to left, wears mantle wrapped around her outstretched legs; left hand supports snakelike creature that rises toward her face; right arm is entwined with left arm of young man (A, above). Beyond tree, (D) bearded man stands in three-quarter profile to left, chin on hand, with right foot on pile of stones at base of tree; between him and mask below adjacent handle, another tree. Side II: At left, square pillar surmounted by square capital, beside which (E) young man sits to left on layered rocks with his head turned back to right, naked, but with drape behind him on rocks and across both thighs (For complete description see Notepad: Full Description 1992-12-22)
Provenance

Provenance Remark

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