Designer: Annemarie Davidson (1920 – 2012)

Item: Enamel Jewels Serving Tray or Bowl

Manufactured by: Annemarie Davidson

Country of origin: United States

Year made: Circa early 1960s

Materials: Copper, enamel and glass

Dimensions:: 11 ¾”in diameter

Condition: Excellent.

References: Nelson, Harold; Jazzar, Bernard, Painting with Fire: Masters of Enameling in America, 1930-1980. Long Beach Museum of Art, California (2006); Rosenberg, Alan, Alluring Enamel. Modernism Magazine: (Spring 2003) pages 68–72; Jazzar, Bernard N and Nelson, Harold B. The Enamels of Annemarie Davidson, Glass on Metal, The Enamellist’s Magazine, Volume 27 Number 5 December 2008, pages 98-100; periodical California Design: 6 in 1960.

Description: Here is a beautiful and larger sized Jewels plate in the much harder to find serving bowl shape by Davidson from the early 1960s. We have seen in some literature that this model was used for chips and dips based on the form. The larger sized pieces tend to be scarcer in general, and these examples with the indented bowl center are much harder to find. The design on this is a visually appealing group of alternating light and dark blue jewels that orbit the center bowl section with gold and blue sgraffito rays radiating outward to the edge. This would make a great centerpiece for a table or large accent piece in any modern home.

Davidson had a thriving retail business creating enamel objects with objective imagery that is somewhat kitschy, such as birds, trees, frogs, and other depictions from life, and which can be easily found in thrift shops. However, her abstract work is her most highly regarded and was her “fine art” practice. That work was exhibited at California Design in 1960 and several western museums. She was listed in Craftsmen of the Southwest in 1965, which only listed eight enamelists total including Fred Ball, Margaret Montgomery Barlow, Nik Krevitsky, June Schwarcz, Kay Whitcomb and Elllamarie and Jackson Woolley.

Davidson was born in Berlin in 1920, and came to the US in 1936. She studied economics at New York University and later at Columbia University. She studied enameling with the prominent enamel pioneer Doris Hall in the 1950s. Davidson moved to southern California with her husband in 1946, and lived and worked in the Los Angeles area until her death in 2012.

In her work, Davidson frequently uses pieces of glass of varying sizes to create irregular organic shapes which she called her “jewels.” These raised forms appear to float on the liquid surface of the vessel or plates. On many of her abstract compositions such as this, she also used a sgraffito technique, incising straight lines with the sharp point of a dart. These hand-drawn lines, which fan out from a central focal point, present a linear counterpoint to the more fluid, organic and sculptural form of the jewels.

Her works were exhibited in her lifetime at the Pasadena Art Museum, Long Beach Museum of Art, Mobile Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art, and are now beginning to be widely collected.

We have a large selection of Davidson’s jewel objects available in varying sizes and color combinations so please let us know if there is a particular size or color combination you are looking for, because we may have an example for sale.