Textile Design with Parasoles with Roses and Ribbon Bows and Heart Motifs

Vertical panel with a textile design that is part of a group of 266 textile designs by the American artist Robert Bryer, possibly made for United Designing Co., since most of the designs carry a stamp of the "United Designing Co. / WOrth 4 - 8975". Some of them also contain a stamp in the verso of the "Original Designing Company, Inc."

The collection contains a great variety of designs, from the more traditional floral and stripe patterns, to thematic designs based on various travel destinations, with palm trees and other holiday attributes. Especially interesting among these are patterns inspired by textiles and paintings of Native American tribes, including the Inca, Navajo, Aztec and Maya. The patterns are composed of semi-abstract figures distributed across the design in a regular or, in some cases, a more casual fashion. The spontaneity of designs and the use of floral and animal motifs suggest they were created for printed textiles in the forties.

This textile design is made up of closed white parasoles with red flowers and a red ribbon bow tied around the handle, small white heart motifs and larger white heart motifs mordered with blue dots and framed with a relatively thick dark blue line with offsetting thorns over a blue ground. This design presents a playful re-creation of "chintz" motifs that took place in the production of American textiles during the 1930s and 1940s, by including the traditionally used roses as decorations for figurative motifs.