1960's Flower Vase by Vladislav Urban for Rosice Glasswork

This is an original flower vase designed by czech artist vladislav urban (1937-2022) and produced by rosice glasswork in the 1960’s. Vladislav urban was a talented and inventive glass artist working in the second half of the 20th century. Urban wasn’t just a great designer, he was also a very brave man whose sense of justice meant that his career was unfairly cut short after urban made a brave public statement against the soviet occupation of czechoslovakia in 1968. Despite urban being one of the pioneers and inventors of incredibly high quality technique of press glass being made directly from the mould, he was fired for his political views and banned from officially working in the czech glassworks. This particular vase was designed in 1969. Urban used his trademark technique of glass poured into a mould which created the beautiful abstract form of effortlessly intersecting shapes (urban called this pattern “moravia”). The vase is a great manifesto of urban’s talent to treat glass to an expressive sculptural form. This vase is in great vintage condition without any chips and only with absolutely minimal wear gained over the years. There is a small discolouration on one part of the inside rim, which looks as though it’s a hairline crack but is in fact inside the glass itself and is from the imperfections from the process of production (see photo).