Walter Abner Burns Nichols was one of the most colorful of the American adventurer/entrepreneurs in 1920s China. The Nichols name has come to be used almost synonymously with the ‘Chinese deco’ rugs manufactured in Tientsin, China in the 1920s and 1930s. Nichols did not originate the Chinese deco style, but he did a great deal to popularize it and to maintain its high standards of manufacture.
Nichols began in his youth as a first-class wool grader who went to Tientsin around 1920 to work for the Elbrook family of wool merchants. Nichols started his own business a couple of years later. In a brochure he produced in the late ’20s, with the assistance of Pande-Cameron, he announced: “In 1924 W.A.B. Nichols of Tientsin, North China, introduced the Super Chinese Rug which has become world famous. It is known in every market as the most durable and beautiful product of the modern Chinese weavers art and adorns the homes of people all over the earth.”
Handbuilt earthenware sculpture with a golden light brown glaze.
Marks: Hulda Rotier Fischer 36 (hand incised)
H: 6 1/2″ x W: 7″ x D: 5 1/2″
Price: $2,300
Hulda Rotier Fisched studied at the Milwaukee Normal School and was a student of Robert von Neumann Sr. In 1921 she also studied with Carl Holty. She worked as an Art Instructor at Shorewood Opportunity School for 30 years. Rotier Fischer was a Member of the Milwaukee Art institute.
She is the recipient of many Milwaukeee Journal Awards.
Pedro de Lemos / Art Deco Orange glazed American Pottery Clydesdale Horse Sculpture c. 1930
PEDRO DE LEMOS (1882-1945) Bay Area, California
Clydesdale horse sculpture c. 1930
Hand modeled orange glazed terra cotta.
Marks: De Lemos Palo Alto (sticker on the bottom), various pencil notations on the foot bottom
H: 9 1/8″ x D: 3 1/2″ x W: 9 1/2″
Pedro Joseph de Lemos (25 May 1882 Austin, Nevada – 5 December 1945) was an American painter, printmaker, architect, illustrator, writer, lecturer and museum director. He started his art career in the Bay Area. He studied under Arthur Frank Mathews at the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art in 1900, later was a student of George Bridgman at the Art Students League in New York and of Arthur Wesley Dow at Columbia University Teachers College. The influence of traditional Japanese woodcuts is clearly seen in his work.
Pedro’s father Francisco, a cobbler, emigrated from the Azores in 1872, and settled in Oakland, California where Pedro was educated. Pedro and his brothers Frank and John all followed careers in art. Pedro was employed by Pacific Press Publishing Company between 1900 and 1906, afterwards starting the Lemos Illustrating Company with his brothers in 1907. Later this became known as the Lemos Brothers Art and Photography Studio, which offered art classes in copper, leather and landscaping as well as the traditional media of drypoint, etching and illustrating.
Lemos worked from a studio overlooking Lake Merritt and taught art at the University of California, Berkeley, working at the same time as illustrator and designer and giving classes in decorative design and etching at the San Francisco Institute of Art, where he had earlier studied when it was the Mark Hopkins Institute. He helped found the California Society of Etchers and an aqua print of his was acclaimed at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition, for which he helped organise the California print exhibition. He filled the position of Professor of Design at Stanford University and became director of the Stanford University Museum of Art in 1919. Besides being the first president of the Carmel Art Association, he was an affiliate member of several art organisations such as the California Society of Etchers, the California Print Makers, the Palo Alto Art Association, the Chicago Society of Etchers and the Bohemian Club. In 1943 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in London.
Andre Arbus (attr.) French Art Deco Straw Marquetry Box c. 1940
ANDRÉ ARBUS (attr.) (1903-1969) France
Straw marquetry box c. 1940
Natural gold and ebony stained straw inlaid in a design of a window pane diamond pattern on the hinged lid, original suede cloth/paper interior, wood frame
For more information see: André Arbus: architecture-décorateur des années 40, Yvonne Brunhammer (Paris: l’Editions NORMA, 1996).
Alexandre Noll rare and early Art Deco mahogany and glass box c. 1930
ALEXANDRE NOLL (1890-1970) France
Covered box c. 1930
Mahogany with ebony peg details and 1 ¼ inch thick Saint-Gobain glass.
Marks: ANoll
Provenance: Private Collection New York, Galerie de Beyrie Paris, Odile Noll (A. Noll’s daughter), Alexandre Noll Estate
For more information see: Alexandre Noll, Olivier Jean-Elie, Pierre Passebon (Paris:Edition du Regard, 1999); Alexandre Noll: Les Matres de L’ Art Decoratif Contemporain, Collection dirigée par R. Moutard-Uldry edited by (Geneve: Pierre Cailler, 1954); Le Mobilier du Xxe Siécle: Dictionnaire des
Créateurs, Pierre Kjellberg (Paris: Les Éditons de l’Amateur, 1994) p. 455-456.
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