Unusual Scalloped Tray with Tin Frame

Unusual among Spratling's output, this tray is built of thick wood scalloped around its perimeter and framed in tin, its surface further worked with stamped flowers, a folk-decorative register rather than the austere geometry of his silver. It dates to the first design period, 1931 to 1946.

Tin was a material Spratling's workshop used in this era for objects outside the silver line, and the stamped-flower decoration and scalloped edge point toward Mexican vernacular craft rather than the modernist forms of his hollowware.

As a wood-and-tin tray rather than a silver one, it is a comparatively rare survival from the early workshop's broader range of household objects.

Los Angeles County Museum of ArtLos Angeles, California

Tray, circa 1930

Accession M.2018.68.35. Official museum record Photo: Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Verified against each institution's own collection records. All museum collections