Sharp’s note seems to be wrong as there are no paintings by this title in known exhibitions of the late 1920s. This is most likely a painting titled Pottery Decorators completed in 1915 in Sharp’s new studio and exhibited in the San Diego California Pacific Exposition that year. In Sharp’s list of paintings he sent to San Diego is one titled Pottery Decorators that he indicated as measuring 30 x 40 in. (Sharp Papers) Sharp was often vague about measurements, though, so this thought to be that work.
An earlier, smaller version of this scene, known today as Acoma Pottery Decorators, was completed in about 1913 in his Bell Chapel studio and is, no doubt, a precursor. That earlier version is mentioned as Decorating Pottery, Acoma in the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune (11/23/13) (probably related image, #58a)
Pottery Decorators; [The Pottery Decorators]
Record ID: 58
Date: ca.1915; [1920]
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 34 1/2 x 46 1/2 in.
Signature / Inscription:
LR: JHSHARP.
Inscribed on paper tacked to verso: "Pottery Decorators. Considering design for undecorated Olla in Girl’s Lap. Painted Late 1920s"
Owner: Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa, OK
Accession Number: 0137.304
Provenance:
The artist; Thomas Gilcrease, Tulsa, OK; The Thomas Gilcrease Foundation, Tulsa, OK, 1955; present owner by gift
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