Paperweights
by: Michael Kovacek
1987, Michael Kovacek, Vienna
170 pages, hardbound. Call for price & availability
Foreword: “With two large sales exhibitions in the years 1982 and 1985 the Glass Gallery Regine and Michael Kovacek presented valuable glasses of four centuries. Further displays of this kind are in preparation.
Our recent experience as well as close contact with glass collectors have shown the great interest in exhibitions devoted to a special limited field of collection. The advantage of such special displays is the extremely wide variety offered. The comprehensive range of different objects helps the glass lover to choose individually and to make comparisons. After thorough preparation the Glass Gallery Regine and Michael Kovacek presents exclusively paperweights. In this first special exhibition, the display comprising approximately 300 exhibits, of which 185 are illustrated in colour and described in detail on the following pages of this catalogue. In addition the catalog contains technical essays on the topic, which makes it a technical publication. For the collector this catalogue will provide additional interesting information; for those who are discovering the fantastic, magical world of these glass balls for the first time, it will give a comprehensive introduction to this fascinating field of collection.
In the USA, in the UK and in France paperweights have been collected for decades, and this has lead to the existence of important and famous collections. Parts thereof have been donated to museums. The largest number of books on the topic of paperweights has been published in English, whereas there is only one German book available, Paperweights aus Saint-Louis” by Gerard Ingold, dealing exclusively with paperweights manufactured there. The Book “Paperweights Briefbeschwerer aus Glas” (Munich 1981) by James Mackay is out of print. So the catalogue of this exhibition is also intended to meet this need.
Market research has clearly shown that paperweights have undergone a tremendous increase in value, and that this trend is continuing. Very rare examples go for five digit dollar sums. This, of course, has an impact on the whole field of collection; the so-called “late Bohemian” paperweights made in the first decades of the 20th century are also profiting from this development and have become interesting pieces for more and more collectors.”
