Antique Burslem Faience Floral Globe Vase from Gibsons & Sons, 1890s

Details

Description

A rounded, globe-like earthenware body gives this arts and crafts faience vase a distinctive, robust profile, balanced by a sharply … Read more A rounded, globe-like earthenware body gives this arts and crafts faience vase a distinctive, robust profile, balanced by a sharply contrasting flat-collared rim and a matching low circular foot finished in a deep reddish-brown glaze. The broad, curved surface provides an expansive, uninterrupted ground well suited to fluid botanical decoration in the painterly tradition of late victorian art potteries. The exterior is freely hand-painted under a glossy clear glaze with large yellow floral blooms, leafy green stems and unopened buds. Strong dark outlines delineate the individual petals and veined leaves, creating crisp graphic separation against a brushed, mottled cobalt blue wash. Varying tones of pale ochre, butter-yellow and olive-green produce a lively, organic sense of movement as the foliage sweeps around the entire circumference. Underneath, the recessed earthenware base shows fine age-related glaze crazing across an off-white ground. It is stamped with an impressed maker's mark reading 'g & s. Ld' directly above 'england', pointing to gibsons & sons of burslem, staffordshire, alongside faint underglaze potter or decorator marks. The addition of the country stamp indicates manufacture dating to around the 1890s. Standing 14 cm in height with a maximum width and diameter of 14 cm, this compact spherical vessel makes a striking decorative accent on a shelf or sideboard. The confident brushwork, strong colour contrasts and unpretentious earthenware potting capture the decorative aesthetic of the english arts and crafts movement. See less