Footed Bowl

At least from the second half of the 15th century until the late 17th century, Venice was the place that produced the glasses most highly valued in the whole of Europe and beyond. They were manufactured in many workshops on the island of Murano. The clientele ranged from the upper middle classes to the highest ecclesiastical and secular dignitaries.

Particularly sought-after products were naturally imitated by competing glassworks, copied or adapted to the tastes of the regional clientele. Such glasses are usually called Façon de Venise. The distinction between these and “authentic” products from Venice was, however, difficult or impossible even for contemporary glassmakers and glass traders, partly because Venetian glassmakers often emigrated despite the prohibitions against it.

Footed bowls are the most common surviving Venetian glass vessels from the first half of the 16th century. Most of them are made of colourless glass. The bowl usually has twelve ribs, while the foot often has a different number, here nineteen. Often a horizontal blue thread trails along the rim of the foot, the lip and slightly below. Many models included a horizontal band of gold leaf just below the lip of the bowl, but this is usually – as here – abraded and hardly visible.

As the only known example so far, this footed bowl has green threads on the rim of the foot and on the lip in addition to the blue thread on the rim of the lip. That this glass bowl ended up in the collection of the Vitromusée Romont is due to a lucky coincidence. Frieder Ryser, who owns the Vitromusée Romont’s large collection of reverse glass paintings, occasionally acquired glass objects such as this footed bowl in addition to the glass paintings. It is not known whether he was aware that this was a unique piece, as it was never published during his lifetime.