Featured CAMEOS: Show & Tell or Ask & Answer

What makes it so special is not the overall look. It's the craftsmanship that went into creating it. You could put that between a dozen spectacularly carved cameos and it's the one that would stand out. I've never seen anything like it.

The guy that's been carving the Disney cameos offered to do some mixed media on the castle and tinkerbell. I don't know if my wife would have liked it, so I told him no. Maybe one of the next one's I have done, I'll let him do it.

 

Pretty good trick, whoever did it.

 

@Snowman Cometh Lots of Disney jewellery:

https://www.liveauctioneers.com/ite..._20250702_A&utm_medium=email&utm_content=item

 

Recently I’ve got the chance to return home and reorganize my collection, and finally get to take a close photo of this one again. @Bronwen As requested, here’s a clearer photo of the inscription.

 

Silz Jr.?

 

Great photo Nick. Just to remind everyone, we're looking at the reverse of this cameo Medusa:



Sadly, there was no new information to be had. I have been trying to look at it with different eyes, so to speak, see other possibilities in the inscription, but I'm not having any breakthroughs. As bluumz said, there is some resemblance to the way Charles Schmoll signed an abbreviated form of his surname that looks like 'Silz'. However, the one part of a Schmoll signature you can be sure of is the S, missing here.

The quest continues.

 

All I know is... oh my. I'm glad that is in a nice safe place and some philistine scrapper won't be smashing it up to melt the frame!

 

While the quest on Medusa continues, I would like to share this one, which somehow makes me recall of our discussion of Verge. Recently I acquired this precious hardstone cameo and for some unusual traits it possesses it has become one of my favorites so far. Here’re the photos of it:


Now two factors intrigue me most: One is the obvious unusually treat of the jaw, which unlike most cameos, expresses the curvy and fleshy of the muscle. I’ve only seen such treatment on commissioned portraits, but not on mythological theme unless for the very early ones. Second is the expression on the ivy leaves, the curves and thickness of it is the kind of expression I’ve never seen on other cameos yet.

From the style of cutting, the traits of engraving, and the unusual traits above, plus the material features, I guess it’s probably a work from late Georgian to early Victorian, 1800-1850 I suppose. The source didn’t provide much clue except it was formerly in a private noble collection.

The real mystery are the inscriptions on the back. As the picture shows there are three inscribed marks on the back, one on the center and two on the upper edge. It looks to me that the center mark seems to be “v. a.”, and considering the era and engraving characteristics, I’m making a wild hypothesis that the mark might point to Antonio Verge? Of all the resources I could find, except for the discussion here, the only reliable material about Antonio Verge seems to be the trade record of Castellani and the rest stay in obscure. Though @Bronwen provided an example of legitimate sign of Verge, sometimes an author has multiple ways of signatures, which makes me came up with the idea.

Again, all the above is purely hypothetical and I’m really poor at recognizing handwriting. If you have any thoughts of deciphering the marks on the back, please kindly share with me. Any thoughts are welcomed, much appreciated!

 

I see the number 289, if that's of any use. popz????

 

That's lovely!
I think the safety chain was a later addition. That flip-up ring was to give the option of wearing it as a pendant... though doing such might look odd given the extended length of the pin...
The joolies here will know better than me!

 

I can see her special appeal. I agree that she appears modeled on an actual woman, one who is beginning to develop a double chin (a bit like Queen Victoria) & whose nose is not as straight as a ruler, so she seems almost alive. The hair & ivy leaves are very crisply done, with great depth. Although she departs in some ways from convention, I would consider her an Ariadne type, Ariadne getting on for middle age.

However, I think she & others, including the ones I call "noblewomen", date to the last 20 years of the 19th century & for a little time into the 20th. I also hypothesize that they are the products of multiple hands in workshops. They bear an assortment of numbers & letters on the back. I imagine the numbers as belonging to apprentices & journeymen, with only the artist & perhaps the most skilled assistant, leaving their initials or name.

This is a competent noblewoman type from my collection:



On the reverse there are a profusion of marks, some of them scratched out, with a not-quite-legible surname in the middle:



Surely the marks record the hands the piece passed through on its way to completion. I also suspect that German workshops were the source of some of them.

I looked at your marks both ways around:




The central mark could be TT. They are not European 7s.

While I think your lady is extremely nice, I think Antonio Vergé can be ruled out as the author.

Coincidentally, I just acquired an Ariadne type myself. She does not have the personality of yours; her profile is a standard idealized one. If I can get any decent photos I will show her. She also has an assortment of marks on the reverse.

 

Did this piece arrive. How does it look after you gave it a wash? any updates on it?

 

It never occurred to me that the prototype could be Ariadne until now. Very interesting idea, maybe I missed it because of the lacking of spiral hair. Also I guess It could be a deviation from bachus/bacchante as well.


I do agree 1800-1850 might be too early for the image, yet I would more willingly put it around 1850, at least before the 80s. The reason I think it that way is the difference in the scoring. Let’s make a comparison. Below is an Ariadne that’s probably 1880 or later, just like the noblewoman example given above. I think during the late 80s era new tools was adopted by most workshops just as we discussed earlier about Filippo Vergé’s case. It provides more steady force as carving tool through some kind of machinery structure and allow a fast pace of producing hardstone cameos. This must gained favor of most engravers, be it Italy, French, German or British, because faster production means efficiency and commercial success in this period. The only problem is that engravers have comparatively less control of the force on the tools than the older way. As can be observed from the Ariadne example below, as well as most later 80s cameos, the cuts became shallower, and most importantly, because of the steady force provided, they bear scorings that looks uniformed, identical, and sometimes even seems like they’re repeating themselves.


On the other hand, this Lady here presents irregular scorings that varying in depths and shapes, which probably implies a relatively primitive tool being used.


It could be possible that such “out-dated” method was still adopted by some workshops in the 80s, but I see no point of choosing this less efficiency way of doing business unless for providing unusual private commission.

 

That's a lot to digest. And I'm always interested in learning more, so would love to have the reference for information on changes in technology employed.

As far as I know (& the technology has not been my main area of interest over the years so I may not know much) until the use of electricity became widespread, machinery for grinding & drilling was driven by foot power, the artisan pedaling or spinning a wheel with the feet, technologies that date back centuries. The use of corundum, & even diamond dust to provide abrasion also dates back centuries. In short, I do not believe that techniques for gem engraving changed very much over the 19th century, as I doubt the cameo-making industry would have been among the first to electrify. The tools for working shell are the same now as they were 150 years ago.

I would attribute differences between individual pieces more to:

• Skill of the artisan
• Preferred techniques of the artisan
• Artistic standards & personal taste of the artisan; quality a piece needs to attain before the artisan is willing to put it on the market
• Time available for making a piece
• Financial pressure that may have dictated how much time could be spent on a single piece
• Labor assistance, or lack thereof, in the form of apprentices

I can think of other things, but these would have been major factors determining stylistic & technical differences. I don't think one can assume that all these things were equal among makers of a given time period or that technology available accounts for major differences.

A major element that did change with time was demand from the buying public: the volume of work required to meet demand; the subjects & materials they wanted; the amount they were willing to pay.

The use of a drill to deepen & round out curls is a technique (employing an ancient technology) I have noted in work of the later 19th/early 20th century. Subtle here, but I have seen Hercules with a head full of little drill holes to make his curly hair.



I think your piece is lovely, & may well have been a personal portrait of a lady styled to look like Ariadne or a maenad/bacchante. It was a popular thing to do. I could comfortably put her to the 1870s. Antonio Vergé appears to have been still active then, so not an impossibility, but I'm not convinced it's likely.

 

Well point made! I feel like this discussion is going to be beneficial For the reference of my little theory on the advance of carving tools for hardstone in the late 19th century, sadly I did not yet find material that directly dressed to this subtle matter. However, some side facts and references might help to prove it.


The foot powered lathe mentioned above is the classic method of treating hardstone since the Renaissance, as I know. Yet it takes days to work on gems and months to finish. When there was possibility to improve that, clever gem craftsman would sure adopt it. The tools being used did not suddenly jump from foot power to modern machines, and Industrial Revolution played a crucial role in it. Here’s an article that mentioned the 19th century Industrial Revolution’s influence on gem cutting:


Here’s another article that discussed how the invention of Steam-powered lathe influenced gemcraft as early as 1860s:


Besides, the scoring difference appears on the two cameos above is universal, not solely example. There’s a trend of style shifting observed widely in works from the late 19th century. Although the reasons above might partly contribute to the change, like lack of time, preference of artisan, they do not necessarily contradicts the theory of new tools being adopted, or to say, they might work together to explain. It is because the rising demand of cameos, thanks to the flourishing of wealthy and middle class in that era brought by Industrial Revolution, that people searched for cameo souvenirs and jewelry. Workshops chose to adopt machine powered lathe to advance the production and save time cost. Some high end workshops might refuse to follow and regard it as inferior in terms of craftsmanship, but the market trend always triumphs human will. By as around 80s to 90s the new method probably dominated the middle and lower cameo markets.


Secondly, the matter of the use of drills. That’s a sharp observation! I too noticed the phenomenon in my journey of collection. However, I would like to disagree with conclusions about connecting the feature to solely later 19th/early 20th century. The use of drills is fundamental since the start of cameo engraving as early as ancient Hellenistic period. Yet the most common use of drill holes on a cameo like that is often at the end of hair curls to form a tiny twist, as this ancient cameo in the collection of National Archeological Museum of Naples shows in the curly of Hercules:


However, although the use of drill to deepen and round out curls is scarcely observed, it is not absolutely absent. Here an ancient Medusa cameo, in the collection of The National Hermitage Museum, shows similar feature in her curls:


When talking about 18th-19th century cameos, although not as common as second half of 19th century, the feature of drilling out curls still persists. Here’s another Medusa, which probably dates to late 18th to early 19th, in the Guy Ladriere collection and his publication, labeled Pichler, shows the same feature of curls drilled out:


This work signed by Elena Pistrucci, probably around 1850, although drills not as heavily used, can still see the curls developed from a hole being drilled out:


And this cameo, in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum and its publications, credit to Luigi Saulini and circa dates 60s-70s, heavily used the technique of deepen and round out curls with drilled holes in the degree of comparable to the maenad lady of mine:


The circa dating around 1870s to me seems a reasonable consensus, but perhaps not likely to be pushed later than that in my opinion. The credit to Antonio Verge is more like a well-meaning joke I made. I do have great interest in deciphering this mystery author who remains in obscure for background information, but no I would not become a blind chasing vain fame


Here’re the references to the two articles above:

1.

https://leondiamond.com/blogs/diamo...O4hStaae_9rSJXW4FwRMyxKzwzbrRuAN6ZKeQdH9weLUd

2.

https://thenorthwaystudio.com/blogs...qcvTHR9g5kMbC1wEdUkPer54kKH8Bfqbep_smnPjVqu7i

 

I think this is critical information on the spread of electrically powered tools for working gems:



"Faceting" is the key word. It makes sense that the cutters of diamonds & other precious gem stones would be the first to adopt this new technology: they had the need; they had the money. The faceting of gems is more of a science than an art.

I can't quite see how machines powered by electricity would lead to repeatability in the realm of engraved gems we are discussing, since the placement, angle & depth of engraving would still have been controlled by hand & eye, as they always have been.

This is from a 1927 newspaper article on Louis Zoellner, a German gem engraver who settled in Brooklyn, New York. (This is my transcription working from a disordered optical character recognition (OCR) version.)

A footpower lathe drives the grinder, which is a nib of soft, Swedish iron on the end of a horizontal small rod of the same metal. The nib is -dressed with diamond dust and oil. This mixture wears away both the tool and the stone as the latter is manipulated against the grinding point or surface by the cameo cutter. It is by this grinding process that the cutter produces bas-relief and intaglio facsimiles of persons and of scenes.

In explaining the delicacy & precision needed, he said:

The grinding of a wrinkle one-thirty-second of an inch too deeply is sufficient to destroy the piece!

 

I do agree that the gem industry would be the first to adopt new technology.

Yet this here is describing the very early prototype of steam powered tools in 1800, and its descendants that became universally adopted before 1860s. And what we are looking at falls around 1880-1890, almost 30years after that in a fast changing, full of invention and innovation society.


Besides, be it facet or grinding, the mechanical logic is the same. It is always by a set of tools, no matter foot powered, steam powered or electrical, that transfers the force through levers or transmission mechanisms to create spinning, for wheel, drill or grinder. “Spinning” here is the true key word, I think.


For understanding of machinery tools lead to uniformity and repeatability, with no offense, I see that you probably haven’t experienced hand working with similar tools before. I can try to explain with my own experience. Though I haven’t work on gem engraving yet, I have worked porcelain art by wheel throwing, and familiar enough with both traditional foot powered wheels and modern machine powered wheels. The working experience is absolutely different. With traditional tools, it is not about eyes&hands, but more like an exercises that requires coordination of the full body and an art of balance of muscles and brains. Moreover, with foot powers, you will never get the tools spinning in the exact same way as the last power push, therefore each carve is always slightly different than the other, creating a subtle but crucial irregularity. Yet with the machine powered tools, all you have to focus is your eyes and hands. And you don’t have to worry about pushing or the force because the tool is always going to spinning in the same way you set it. This constant motion in spinning creates subtle uniformity, all you need is steady hands, which is way easier.