{"product_id":"duncan-ceramic-master-studio-peggy-in-april-hand-painted-figurine-girl-with-a-flower-basket-moulded-and-copyright-dated-1949-fresno-california","title":"Duncan Ceramic Master Studio \"Peggy in April\" Hand-Painted Figurine, Girl with a Flower Basket, Moulded and Copyright-Dated 1949, Fresno, California","description":"\u003ch3\u003eThe Piece\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eA hand-painted ceramic figurine of a girl in a lilac-pink dress, carrying a basket of flowers and gathering her apron in one hand.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThe modelling is soft and rounded, the glaze is a warm cream, and \u003cstrong\u003eeverything on the face is brushwork\u003c\/strong\u003e — the black hair, the drawn lashes and brows, the red mouth, the blue flower tucked above one ear. The dress is washed in lilac with deeper rose in the folds, and the basket is picked out flower by flower.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThe base carries the whole identification, \u003cstrong\u003emoulded into the clay rather than printed on it\u003c\/strong\u003e: \u003cstrong\u003eDuncan Ceramic Master Studio\u003c\/strong\u003e, the oval studio device, \u003cstrong\u003e©49\u003c\/strong\u003e, and the model name \u003cstrong\u003ePEGGY in APRIL\u003c\/strong\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003ch3\u003eHistory \u0026amp; Provenance\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe copyright year is in the clay, so the date needs no argument: 1949.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDuncan is a California pottery with a real history, and most people know only half of it.\u003c\/strong\u003e Erma Duncan began teaching ceramics out of her own home while still in her teens. The family operation outgrew the garage and opened the \u003cstrong\u003efirst Duncan Ceramic Studio on Blackstone Avenue in Fresno in 1946\u003c\/strong\u003e — Erma running art and instruction, her son Bob on sales, her son Dick on design and manufacturing.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e1949 is a specific year in that story.\u003c\/strong\u003e It is the year Dick Duncan formulated \u003cem\u003ethe first non-settling glaze in the ceramics industry\u003c\/em\u003e — the technical breakthrough that turned a family studio into a company. Duncan incorporated in 1955 and became Duncan Enterprises in 1975.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAnd that is why this figurine is a different object from what the Duncan name usually means.\u003c\/strong\u003e Almost everyone who knows Duncan knows it as the mould-and-glaze supplier that armed the American hobby-ceramics trade for half a century. A finished, named, copyright-dated figurine from the studio’s own early production belongs to a much smaller and much earlier body of work — made in the years when Duncan was still a studio making things rather than a company supplying others to make them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePeggy is April in a calendar series.\u003c\/strong\u003e A 1949 Duncan figurine named \u003cem\u003eMay — Larae\u003c\/em\u003e is documented, and other 1949 Duncan “Peggy” figurines have traded. Each month took a girl’s name.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003ch3\u003eProduct Details\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003ctable\u003e\u003ctbody\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eObject\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eHand-painted ceramic figurine, girl with a flower basket\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eModel\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003e“Peggy in April” — April in a named month series\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eMaker\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eDuncan Ceramic Master Studio, Fresno, California\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eDimensions\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eApproximately 6½ in tall\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eDecoration\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eHand-painted throughout — black hair, drawn lashes and brows, red mouth, blue hair flower, lilac and rose dress, individually picked-out basket flowers\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eMarks\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eMoulded into the base: Duncan Ceramic Master Studio, oval studio device, ©49, PEGGY in APRIL\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eEra\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003e1949\u003c\/strong\u003e, from the copyright year moulded into the base. No estimate involved.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eCondition\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eGood. The figurine is sound and stands level, the modelling is crisp, and the hand-painted decoration is bright and unrubbed with the face fully intact. \u003cstrong\u003eThere is fine crazing throughout the glaze\u003c\/strong\u003e — a network of hairlines across the face, neck and basket — which is the normal behaviour of a seventy-five-year-old glaze and not a fault in a display object. \u003cstrong\u003eThere is a small chip to the edge of the base\u003c\/strong\u003e, showing white body, low down and not visible from the front. No cracks, no repairs and no restoration. Condition Guaranteed.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eAvailability\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eOne of a Kind — 1 Available\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003c\/tbody\u003e\u003c\/table\u003e\n  \u003ch3\u003eWhy It Belongs in Your Home\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eA dated object is worth more than a pretty one, and this is both.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eMost decorative ceramics are dated by somebody’s judgment — a style, a glaze, a guess. This one has 1949 moulded into it by the people who made it, along with their name and the name they gave her. In a cabinet of objects whose ages are all estimates, that is quietly authoritative.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eIt also belongs to a specific and collectable moment: \u003cstrong\u003epost-war California pottery\u003c\/strong\u003e, the same years and the same state that produced Florence Ceramics, Hedi Schoop, Brayton Laguna and Kay Finch. Duncan sits alongside them and is far better documented than most.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eAt six and a half inches she goes on a shelf, a mantel, a windowsill or inside a cabinet without crowding anything, and the lilac-and-cream palette is easy against wood, white paint and old books.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eAnd there are eleven more months out there. If you like her, she is the start of something findable — a calendar series is the best kind of collection because it has a natural end.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eA note on care. \u003cstrong\u003eDust with a soft dry brush, not a cloth.\u003c\/strong\u003e A cloth catches on the basket and the hair and takes paint with it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eNever wash it.\u003c\/strong\u003e Crazing means the glaze is no longer a sealed surface: water travels into the hairlines, carries dirt with it, and stains the body from the inside permanently. That damage cannot be reversed.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eKeep her out of direct sun, which yellows a crazed glaze faster than an intact one, and off a windowsill that gets condensation.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Viridian Eclection","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48047805235305,"sku":"VE-0765","price":165.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0651\/0093\/9369\/files\/A4AC25B7-EEAB-4F75-AE19-8B53A4B60393.jpg?v=1789320597","url":"https:\/\/viridianeclection.com\/products\/duncan-ceramic-master-studio-peggy-in-april-hand-painted-figurine-girl-with-a-flower-basket-moulded-and-copyright-dated-1949-fresno-california","provider":"Viridian Eclection","version":"1.0","type":"link"}