Bar Brooch of Three Half Balls

Three half-balls mounted along a silver bar give this brooch its form, a study in repeated volume and clean geometry. The reduction to a single shape, the dome, stated three times is characteristic of Spratling's first-period jewelry, where a controlled vocabulary of forms did the work that ornament might elsewhere.

The half-dome was among the earliest forms to come out of Spratling's workshop; Morrill records simple half-dome earrings among its first pieces (Morrill, pdf p. 39). The bar brooch here puts that same elementary volume to work in series.

Made at the Taller de Las Delicias Spratling founded in Taxco in 1931, the brooch reflects the geometric discipline of his early production. With no recorded reference, it stands as a clean example of that vocabulary.