Clarice Cliff Feature Articles

We were very excited to see an unusual, early plate in Bonham's sale in November 2003 , and Johanna Freidwall has kindly provided an image of this piece.

It is painted freehand, with some outlining in black, turquoise and orange enamels, in an abstract with floral and fruit elements.

The plate is clearly date-marked October 1927, and this plus the Wilkinson backstamp suggest it was decorated soon after that date.

The other mark is hand-written in rust enamel and says:

'Fantasy in Bizarre by Clarice Cliff'

We have seen a cigarette box with a 'Fantasy' mark before, but this piece also alludes to Bizarre AND Clarice Cliff.

We believe it is a sample, or perhaps even just a notion for an idea to show Colley Shorter, which was hand-painted by Clarice Cliff herself.

We know that as early as 1929 she was designing on paper, and getting her ‘girls’ to use these as a way of originating samples, but this piece seems to show she designed on pottery at this time. As such we believe it to be very rare, as few pieces of her pottery were painted by Clarice Cliff herself.

The points that suggest it is by Clarice are that the hand writing is IDENTICAL to hers; most pieces with her signature were done in 'her style' by the 'girls'. Also, we know she was a 'sloppy' paintress from the memories of several 'girls'. On this plate, the enameling does not fill the very casual outlines. Artistically, it is more Spanish or Italianate in style, it does not have any of the Art Deco motifs she was soon to introduce, but we must remember she regarded herself as an industrial designer so it might have been prompted by Colley Shorter?

It represents a fascinating 'missing link' in the evolution of her style, how she created her ideas, and the evidence suggests it was produced between October 1927 and September 1928 by which time the name of her new range was Fantasque.

The plate was sold in Bonham's 25 November 2003 sale. Many thanks to Bonhams for providing the photographs.