Öhrström Picasso Graal

Data: Signed; Orrefors, Sweden, Graal Nr. 1413B, E Öhrström. Height; 17 cm. Motif; Man on prancing "Picasso horse" and manʼs face. 

Exhibited: As far as I am aware, this piece has never been displayed or photographed. However, it will be featured in my next book, unless it is purchased prior to publication, and if the buyer so wishes, it shall not be featured.

Provenance: It was purchased in the late 1980s or early 1990s from "One of the Marks" from "Fifty-Fifty" in lower Manhattan, along with two other pieces.

The piece. This Thick Graal from 1948, if "it" really is from 1948, represents one of the few times someone managed to sneak a design past Edward Hald and into the “Graal studio.” However, as this piece (i) was purchased together with two Ariel vases from 1939 and (ii) looks much more like something from before the war than after, it is likely to be one of the relatively few "cartridges"/"ämnen" that survived the war to be later blown into something. I.e., this is probably a pre-war design completed (or signed) in 1948. Strangely, Öhrström was much more likely to be inspired by Picasso in his very limited Graal designs than in his much more numerous Ariel designs - maybe he used Thick Graal for experimentation... In this Thick Graal, Öhrström most certainly got things right, and had it only been a size or two larger, it would most definitely have been a best-Graal contender.