AN EMERALD-GREEN AND AVENTURINE SANDWICHED GLASS SNUFF BOTTLE QING DYNASTY, 18TH / 19TH CENTURY

Collection of Y.F. Yang, 1982. 
Belfort Collection, 1986. 

Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang, A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles: The Mary and George Bloch Collection, vol. 5, Hong Kong, 2002, no. 735.

In spite of a couple of tiny nibbles to the lip, the overall condition is very good.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Challenging the suggestion that problems involved in re-melting aventurine-glass might have inhibited its use in this way, here is an example furnishing proof that it was so utilized. Although pale and ‘washed-out’ in appearance, and also deprived of much of the splendour of the dazzling gold-star effect from which one of the Chinese names for this type of glass was derived, fragments of aventurine-glass are indubitably contained in the sandwiched layer. This, quite apart from its other unusual features, makes it an extremely rare sandwiched glass bottle.

The white inner layer is also unusual, since it removes the transparency from the upper layers and makes it appear, from a distance, to be a monochrome bottle. The upper layer of transparent sapphire-blue provides another uncommon feature, and the emergence of the sandwiched layer around the outer neck, rather than at the lip, gives it the appearance of a white bottle encased in coloured wrapping.

The white neck is probably the result of the carver’s work in detailing the bottle before polishing it, but yet another feature helps to make it most unusual among sandwiched bottles. It has a foot with a raised foot rim, constituting the exception rather than the rule for this range of bottles. More commonly, they are given either a simple flat foot or a concave depression.

Not only rare, this bottle is also quite delightful, with a complex sandwiched pattern running downwards into more emphatic blue, the impression being of green fading to blue in a gently dappled tumble of colour.