1930s Vase, Nude Man With Harp

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An especially brilliant example of the masterful engraving and high design of Vicke Lindstrand and the Orrefors glass workshop in … Read more An especially brilliant example of the masterful engraving and high design of Vicke Lindstrand and the Orrefors glass workshop in 1930s Sweden, this flaring, bell shaped vase depicts a nude man figure playing an enormous harp. The entire scene has a certain wildness to it -- the mannerist, arched body of the nude figure, his mouth open in ecstatic song, his long hair flowing backwards, and the bubbles rising up around -- all captured in the liquid tones of Orrefors' extremely fine crystal glass. Lindstrand created a renowned series of engraved glass pieces -- often depicting nude male divers and other figures -- during the high point of Orrefors' art glass production in the 1930s. He was one of the leading designers at Orrefors before moving to the Uppsala-Ekeby firm in 1940. As Alistair Duncan points out in his definitive book on Orrefors, Lindstrand developed a line of thick-walled crystal glass at the company and decorated them with a series of quintessentially Art Deco engraved figures. See less