A group of women artists in early 20th-century Chicago illustrated the connection between the decorative arts and the feminist movement in the United States and is the focus of a new book published by RIT Press.
Women, Entrepreneurship, Crafts: Chicago’s Atlan Ceramic Art Club, 1893–1923written by Sharon S. Darling, revisits the Atlan Ceramic Art Club, one of the Midwest’s premier hand-painted porcelain or “china painting” studios. The publication is part of the RIT Press Arts and Crafts Movement Series.
RIT Press
Atlan ceramic plate by Helen Frazee.
The Arts and Crafts movement, popular from 1875 to 1920, sparked an appreciation for craftsmanship, simplicity and natural motifs and influenced the Chicago-based Atlan Ceramic Art Club.
General interest in ceramics spread throughout the country after decorated pottery from France, Britain, and the Far East was exhibited at Philadelphia’s centennial celebration in 1876. Chicago was the center for decorative ceramics in the Midwest when the Atlan Club was founded.
Fifteen women artists founded this elite professional association and exhibited as a group at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. The Atlan Club existed for 30 years and grew to include a younger generation of women of different nationalities, socioeconomic backgrounds and religious affiliations, all committed to a “conventional” style that favored abstract floral and natural motifs painted over geometric shapes and exotic designs.
“Despite the club’s long history, few collectors and curators have heard of the Atlan Ceramic Art Club or recognize the porcelain glaze decorated in the abstract ‘conventional’ style as a significant part of the Arts and Crafts movement,” Darling wrote.
RIT Press
Atlan chocolate pot by Helga Peterson.
Atlan artists exhibited and sold their work at annual exhibitions at the Art Institute of Chicago for over 30 years. Today, only a few examples of the hundreds of plates, bowls, pitchers, tea sets, powder boxes, trays and vases made in this style survive. These objects were both beautiful and practical, and many of them did not survive everyday use. Works signed with the initials of their motto (“Patience, Perseverance, Progress”) above the word “Atlan” are rare, according to the author. The Chicago History Museum has the only major collection of Atlan porcelain in the United States, she said.
The Atlan artists tried unsuccessfully to establish an original style of porcelain painting that would outlast their era. Instead, according to Darling, they introduced a new way of imagining decorative ceramics. They succeeded in establishing the style and its appropriateness to ceramic forms as a new art medium for the American Arts and Crafts movement.”
The Arts and Crafts movement ran parallel to the emerging feminist movement’s focus on individual talent and self-reliance. Porcelain painting was respectable work for women who needed an income. It also trained women to run a business and advance their artistic careers.
“For many women, porcelain painting provided the artistic and managerial skills they needed to become successful ceramicists and businesswomen. For others, it was a bridge to work as interior designers in the 1920s and 1930s, when European-influenced modernism prevailed, or to participate in the studio ceramics movement in America in the early 1940s,” Darling wrote.
Women, Entrepreneurship, Crafts: Chicago’s Atlan Ceramic Art Club, 1893–1923by Sharon S. Darling, is available in hardcover with 176 pages and 216 illustrations. To purchase a copy, visit RIT Press.
