Authentic trench art brass shell casing, elaborately embellished with a pair of swirling Chinese dragons and made into an extraordinary table lamp. The artwork was created in relief with hand-chased background. The artist duplicated the dragon art on the sheet brass base cover. An incredible work of military art! The shell stands 17 1/2" tall and the lamp is 31" in height to the top of the lampshade (as shown). The lamp base measures 10 1/2" in diameter and covers a weighted steel bottom. Weighs 11 1/2 pounds. The lamp comes with a 14" (bottom ring) slightly tapered lampshade (as shown), with horizontal pleated linen white cloth covering.
CONDITION: The lamp shell casing and base is all original from the artists creation. We have upgraded the lamp with new wiring, lamp socket and hardware.
HISTORY: Trench art refers to objects made by anyone in response to conflict or recycled out of war materials. The dragon was a popular symbol in the WWII Pacific Theater and Korean War, especially China. The 3"/50 caliber gun is a United States naval gun terminology indicates the gun fired a projectile 3 inches (76 mm) in diameter, and the barrel was 50 calibers long (length is 3 in × 50 = 150 in or 3.8 m). Different guns (identified by Mark numbers) of this caliber were used by the U.S. Navy and U.S. Coast Guard from 1890 through the 1990s on a variety of combatant and transport ship classes.
