All About Glass

All About Glass

This is your resource for exploring various topics in glass: delve deeper with this collection of articles, multimedia, and virtual books all about glass. Content is frequently added to the area, so check back for new items. If you have a topic you'd like to see covered, send us your suggestion. If you have a specific question, Ask a Glass Question at our Rakow Research Library.

Morgan Cup
Article

The Morgan Cup [52.1.93] is a Roman cameo glass of the first century A.D. It may have been found in the ancient city of Heraclea Pontica, modern Eregli, Turkey. The cup was once in the collection of J. Pierpont Morgan (hence its name). It came to the Museum in 1952 as the gift of Arthur A. Houghton

Cameo Glass
Video

Discover the history of Roman cameo glass, and lean how it is made, with experts at The Corning Museum of Glass. This video was featured in the exhibit Reflecting Antiquity at The Corning Museum of Glass, February 15 through May 27, 2008.

Cameo Glass Blank
Video

Some of the first glassblowers working in Italy—perhaps as early as 30 BC—made blanks for craftspeople accustomed to decorating hardstone objects. The glassblowing process required two contrasting glasses, usually blue and white.

Replica of Portland Vase
Video

Listen as curator David Whitehouse describes this replica of The Portland Vase, an ancient Roman cameo glass object that was taken to England from Italy in 1783. The fame of The Portland Vase and of Josiah Wedgwood's replicas, played a major role in the establishment of cameo glassmaking in

The Corning Ewer
Video

Listen as former curator David Whitehouse describes the Corning Ewer, an outstanding example of Islamic relief-cut cameo glass. A layer of transparent light green glass was applied to a layer of colorless glass. Most of the outer layer was then cut away, leaving the decoration in relief. Although

The Morgan Cup
Video

Listen as curator David Whitehouse describes the Morgan cup. The rarest and most elaborate luxury vessels of the early Roman Empire are cameo glasses. These objects were inspired by relief-cut gems of banded semiprecious stones, such as onyx. Glassmakers cased (covered) objects of one color with

The Morgan Cup- Technique
Video

Listen as glass artist William Gudenrath describes the technique used to make the Morgan cup. The rarest and most elaborate luxury vessels of the early Roman Empire are cameo glasses. These objects were inspired by relief-cut gems of banded semiprecious stones, such as onyx. Glassmakers cased

An Unusual Fragment of Cameo Glass
Article

The subject of this note is a fragment of cameo glass [59.1.509] (Figs. 1 and 2), now in The Corning Museum of Glass, that was formerly in the collection of Ray Winfield Smith. 1 It was shown in the 1957 exhibition Glass from the Ancient World as part of a group of early Islamic cameo glass, which

The Seasons Vase
Article

The "Vase des Saisons" is the name given by Jean de Foville to a cameo glass bottle in the Cabinet des Medailles et Antiques of the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris. (Figs. A, B, C "Alabastron en verre camée" (Camée.623)). The object may be described as follows: H. (as restored) 16

Reflecting Antiquity: Modern Glass Inspired by Ancient Rome
Article

A groundbreaking exhibition produced by the J. Paul Getty Museum and The Corning Museum of Glass, Reflecting Antiquity: Modern Glass Inspired by Ancient Rome opened on October 18, 2007 at the Getty Villa in Los Angeles, and ran through January 14, 2008. Then it traveled to The Corning Museum of

Portland Vase Iconography
Article

The Portland Vase is the best-known ancient Roman cameo glass vessel. It is in the collection of the British Museum in London. For some pieces of art, the meaning of a figural scheme is clear; in others, the interpretation takes years to decipher; and in the %%case%% of the Portland Vase, scholars

Eight Sledgehammers on Glass: The 'Warrior' Vase in The Corning Museum of Glass
Article

Since its accession in 1957, the 'Warrior' vase ranks among the highlights of the collection. Glass making had been known in ancient China, but was only reintroduced to China during the reign of the emperor Kangxi (1662-1722) by Jesuit missionaries. 1   The Beijing palace glassworks were