Carved Agate Falcon on Native Copper Base by Gerd Dreher


Idar-Oberstein, Germany Indisputably a virtuoso work of Lapidary Art, Dreher's keen observation of the avian world is apparent in this fine carving of a falcon. Employing a combination of types of agates, the mottled feathers are realistically depicted. The wing edges and tail feathers are formed of highly transparent banded agate inset into speckled agate, with more solid colored agates used for the throat and head and beak. The feathers on his back are carved of hawk's eye quartz (a rare blue variety of tiger's eye quartz from South Africa) which provides a chatoyant sheen. With his outstretched wings, he alights atop a copper specimen having some traces of quartz, imitating a mountainous outcropping. Raised on a circular rock crystal quartz base. Inscribed monogram GD for Gerd Dreher. Height 12in (30.5cm)
|Provenance: Purchased from Bonhams & Butterfields, Los Angeles, Natural History, Sale 16089, Lot 4263.Gerd DreherThe exquisitely detailed animal carvings of Gerd Dreher make his works among the most sought-after masterpieces of the lapidary arts. Born in 1943 in Idar-Oberstein, Gerd was a fourth generation animal figure carver. Dreher's family has been involved in the art of engraving and carving gemstones for nearly two hundred years. A long-established family tradition of producing hardstone and gem animal carvings was begun in the 19th Century and by the early 1900s their name was synonymous with that of the jeweler, Carl Fabergé. The Russian master, on his frequent trips to Idar, would provide plaster models of whimsical animal carvings, which the Dreher family would create out of jasper, agate and jade. Fabergé then sold them in his famed salons in St. Petersburg, Moscow and London. Gerd was a keenly observant naturalist who maintained a massive library of videotapes of animals in motion. His devotion to realism in muscle and animation is what sets his carvings apart. In 2004 a major retrospective exhibition of 60 works entitled The Gem Carvings of Gerd Dreher: A Fabergé Legacy, was held at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. In the words of Joel Bartsch, Curator of Gems and Minerals for the Museum, "Dreher's ability to breathe life into stone has made him one of the most famous practitioners of the craft in the world today. His work is a marriage of art and science."