ÉMILE GALLÉ (1846-1904)

Émile Gallé's verreries parlantes ('speaking glassware') incorporates a literary or poetic quotation to his design. These inscriptions are typically wheel-engraved and are placed in such a way that necessitates the handling the object by the viewer. The present vase is engraved with an adaptation of a verse by René François Sully Prudhomme (1839-1907) from "Les serres et les bois" in Les Solitudes, opposing the artificial flowers and the wild violets along the stem. Poet and essayist Sully Prudhomme was the first winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1901.