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Amalric Walter and Henri Bergé "Crabe" Pâte de Verre Vide-Poche Glass Dish

$19,500

This French "Crabe," or "Crab," pâte de verre vide-poche glass dish by Amalric Walter and Henri Bergé, is an elongated green and blueish dish, with murky, swirling hues, mimicking the appearance of a small eddy of a brook, frozen in time and space by the artist. Presiding over this small aquatic universe is a deep, reddish-brown crab with highlights of bright yellow adorning his gnarled back. So intricate and so accurately knobbly are the crabs outstretched limbs that he seems to meld into the beautiful tangle of similarly colored, trailing strands of kelp that emanate in every direction from his formidable perch.

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  • Product Details
  • Curator's Notes

Item #: P-17777
Artist: Amalric Walter and Henri Bergé
Circa: 1920
Dimensions: 2" height, 11.75" width, 5.25" deep
Materials: Pâte de verre glass 
Signed: "A WALTER NANCY" and "hBerge sc"
Literature: Similar vide-poche is pictured in Amalric Walter (1870-1959), by Keith Cummings, Kingswinford: Broadfield House Glass Museum, 2006, p. 25, cat. no .30
 

Pâte de verre material was produced by grinding glass into a fine powder, adding a binder to create a paste, and adding a fluxing medium to facilitate melting. The paste is brushed or tamped into a mold, dried, and fused by firing, meaning this is not only one of the most technically difficult manners in which to create glass objects.

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