Very small, slender chip lower right edge, top
left corner a paint miss, other very minor
marks. Style:
Floral A nice floral design in earth tones with a
brilliant glaze. There's a very unique sense to
the finish, no doubt it could be achieved by
hand but at some great cost, this is actually a
very clever printing process but I'm not quite
sure how it was achieved. One thing has come to
light, quite obvious once noticed but otherwise
elusive indeed it has to my knowledge eluded all
other tile writers and likely most if not all
collectors. Sherwin & Cotton was the leading art tile
specialist traversing the intersection of art
and technology and Niello tiles are a brilliant
example for what gives them their unique feel
and appeal is a product of something tile makers
otherwise only first achieved to limited extent
in the mid 20th century. The decoration is
applied before the clay is fired. Making a decorated, glazed tile in a single
firing has long been an aim of major tile
makers, one sees it in some pottery tiles but
the results were too inconsistent for
mass-producers and one never knows what the
success rate of the pottery tiles was for the
volume of scrap output has always been high in
ceramic manufacture at least until the mid 20th
century. The part of the process where faults
would reveal was in firing so reducing tile
manufacture to one firing was always
desirable. The limitation was in the colours available
for similar to encaustic and barbotine tiles the
colours had to withstand the higher teperature
of clay firing not the lower temperature of
glaze firing nevertheless Sherwin & Cotton
used some bright colours with the Niello
process.. The Niello clay is often speckled like a
sparse oatmeal clay, it may have had slightly
higher moisture content for shrinkage flaws, or
not flaws because they were intended, frequently
occur in Niello tiles. The most obvious clue is
that the pattern number is frequently incised in
to the back, one can't easily do that with fired
clay and it means the pattern was known before
the clay was fired. Mass produced wares especially decorated
wares were criticised by the arts and crafts
advocates and manufacturers for being too
uniform yet there is a certain sameness that is
required for sets of things to work and that is
very expensive to achieve by hand. It is amply
demonstrated by arts & crafts pottery, one
sees vases and chargers, a few jugs and not a
lot else. The main business in pottery is
tableware, fifty, one hundred, two hundred
pieces all which have to look as if they belong
in the set, arts & crafts simply couldn't do
it. William de Morgan didn't really do it in
tiles, most being painted to outlines the
outlines being created in various ways. We know
some were painted on tracing paper in Italy and
shipped to London for applying to tiles, it
certainly wouldn't surprise me if he used a
printed outline that would burn away in the
kiln, carbon printing had already been invented.
Some companies employed good artists to paint
not to any form of outline but from the drawing
in the pattern book, we see fabulous freehand
painted tiles from Craven Dunnill, quite amazing
work from the Decorative Art Tile Company,
William Yale etc yet all manner of companies
produced some properly painted works. So the innovative tile companies tried to
produce mass produced goods with a degree of
randomness that makes every piece unique in a
similar way to the slight variations that occur
with stencilling, Marsden certainly tried and
had a couple of printing patents that seem to
have been aimed at introducing some variety, I
am pretty sure that Maw did. Patent Niello was
such a printing method from Sherwin & Cotton
combined with the managed unpredictability
admired by the arts & crafts movement.
Sherwin & Cotton was truly at the
intersetion of art and technology. Verso clear of adhesive etc, some smoke
stain, embossed knot in triangle mark and
England, painted pattern number. Tiny surface chip near mid left edge, tiny chip
bottom right corner, very minor sruface marks.
Condition: Fine
Price: £120 (approx. $164)
Stock number: 07216
Technique: Patent
Niello
Maker: Sherwin & Cotton
Dimensions: 6"
x 6"
Date: 1893 (circa)
Condition:
Excellent
Price: £90 (approx. $123)
Stock number: 07216B
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