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<p>[QUOTE="Bronwen, post: 2845508, member: 5833"]I have seen cameos still in their Cameo Corner box. They have been very fine ones.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Napoleon & his court started the fashion for cameos that spread to other royal houses & then outward to other strata of society. The Swedish royal family treasure <a href="http://www.thepracticalgemologist.com/jewelry-history-1/2015/8/4/the-swedish-cameo-tiara" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.thepracticalgemologist.com/jewelry-history-1/2015/8/4/the-swedish-cameo-tiara" rel="nofollow">the tiara they have that was originally Napoleonic</a>. If you had any pretension to being <i>au courant</i> you had a cameo. You cannot just lump every relief carving into the category 'cameo' & assign the same value to them all. They are not all shell & the quality of the work varies from exquisite to why-would-you-want-that?</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>I do not have time or inclination to read everything that has now been posted to this thread, so have not seen the evident slight to cameos. There is no way I can be convinced that this signed hardstone cameo set in gold ornamented with pearls, diamonds & enamel is not fine jewellery.</p><p><br /></p><p><img src="https://d3h6k4kfl8m9p0.cloudfront.net/stories/CXdxT47h.dYqRJFGoQUOew-smallw.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /></p><p><br /></p><p>The general quality of shell cameos fell off greatly in the later 19th; cameos of that sort, even if they did sometimes get set in gold, I would not call fine jewellery. It is all in the quality of the work & the material used as a secondary consideration. This is shell, but in my opinion the level of workmanship makes it fine jewellery.</p><p><br /></p><p><img src="https://d3h6k4kfl8m9p0.cloudfront.net/stories/iWokesRu7CLUSoV-Wd90hg.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /></p><p>(Note the central cameo in the Swedish cameo tiara.)</p><p><br /></p><p>This cameo in blackened silver is one of the most valuable in my collection, in part because it is signed by an engraver who did not produce a large body of work.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]282434[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Catherine was the one who really put Tassie on the map after she ordered a complete set of his thousands of impression in his top of the line material, glass, plus a custom cameo encrusted cabinet to hold them. It is still in the Hermitage.</p><p><br /></p><p>I don't think Tassie would object to having his productions characterized as molded, but his molds produced exceptionally sharp images. The molds were made from impressions of the gems in the great collections of his time (many later bought up by Catherine). The most expensive were made in glass of the same color as the original stone, then the hard white glass he called 'enamel', sulfur, & plaster. They were collected like crazy. This craze was contemporaneous with the passion for cameos, which by & large used imagery taken from the engraved gems, available to carvers of cameos by way of the impressions.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>
[QUOTE="Bronwen, post: 2845508, member: 5833"]I have seen cameos still in their Cameo Corner box. They have been very fine ones. Napoleon & his court started the fashion for cameos that spread to other royal houses & then outward to other strata of society. The Swedish royal family treasure [URL='http://www.thepracticalgemologist.com/jewelry-history-1/2015/8/4/the-swedish-cameo-tiara']the tiara they have that was originally Napoleonic[/URL]. If you had any pretension to being [I]au courant[/I] you had a cameo. You cannot just lump every relief carving into the category 'cameo' & assign the same value to them all. They are not all shell & the quality of the work varies from exquisite to why-would-you-want-that? I do not have time or inclination to read everything that has now been posted to this thread, so have not seen the evident slight to cameos. There is no way I can be convinced that this signed hardstone cameo set in gold ornamented with pearls, diamonds & enamel is not fine jewellery. [IMG]https://d3h6k4kfl8m9p0.cloudfront.net/stories/CXdxT47h.dYqRJFGoQUOew-smallw.jpg[/IMG] The general quality of shell cameos fell off greatly in the later 19th; cameos of that sort, even if they did sometimes get set in gold, I would not call fine jewellery. It is all in the quality of the work & the material used as a secondary consideration. This is shell, but in my opinion the level of workmanship makes it fine jewellery. [IMG]https://d3h6k4kfl8m9p0.cloudfront.net/stories/iWokesRu7CLUSoV-Wd90hg.jpg[/IMG] (Note the central cameo in the Swedish cameo tiara.) This cameo in blackened silver is one of the most valuable in my collection, in part because it is signed by an engraver who did not produce a large body of work. [ATTACH=full]282434[/ATTACH] Catherine was the one who really put Tassie on the map after she ordered a complete set of his thousands of impression in his top of the line material, glass, plus a custom cameo encrusted cabinet to hold them. It is still in the Hermitage. I don't think Tassie would object to having his productions characterized as molded, but his molds produced exceptionally sharp images. The molds were made from impressions of the gems in the great collections of his time (many later bought up by Catherine). The most expensive were made in glass of the same color as the original stone, then the hard white glass he called 'enamel', sulfur, & plaster. They were collected like crazy. This craze was contemporaneous with the passion for cameos, which by & large used imagery taken from the engraved gems, available to carvers of cameos by way of the impressions.[/QUOTE]
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