{
"data": {
"id": 111542,
"accession_number": "1930.118",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Nautch Dancer, c. 1930. Waylande Gregory (American, 1905\u20131971), Cowan Pottery Studio (America, Rocky River, Ohio, 1920\u20131931). Ceramic; overall: 44.2 x 21.3 x 12.1 cm (17 3/8 x 8 3/8 x 4 3/4 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Dudley P. Allen Fund, 1930.118",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Nautch Dancer",
"creation_date": "c. 1930",
"creation_date_earliest": 1930,
"creation_date_latest": 1930,
"artists_tags": [
"May Show",
"male"
],
"culture": [
"America, Ohio, Cleveland"
],
"technique": "ceramic",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Decorative Art and Design",
"collection": "Decorative Arts",
"type": "Ceramic",
"measurements": "Overall: 44.2 x 21.3 x 12.1 cm (17 3/8 x 8 3/8 x 4 3/4 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"overall": {
"height": 0.442,
"height_inch": 17,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.375,
"width": 0.213,
"width_inch": 8,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.375,
"depth": 0.121,
"depth_inch": 4,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.75
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "left side of base: \"Waylande Gregory\"; on back of base: \"COWAN.\"",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 381826,
"title": "The May Show: 12th Annual Exhibition of Works by Cleveland Artists and Craftsmen",
"description": "The May Show: 12th Annual Exhibition of Works by Cleveland Artists and Craftsmen. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 22-June 1, 1930).",
"opening_date": "1930-04-22T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 312185,
"title": "Retrospective Twenty-fifth Anniversary May Show",
"description": "Retrospective Twenty-fifth Anniversary May Show. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 13-February 14, 1943).",
"opening_date": "1943-01-13T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 443051,
"title": "Art Deco",
"description": "Art Deco. Beck Center for the Arts, Lakewood, OH (organizer) (September 7-October 15, 1979).",
"opening_date": "1979-09-07T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 310252,
"title": "Cleveland Art Comes of Age: 1919-1940",
"description": "Cleveland Art Comes of Age: 1919-1940. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 28-September 10, 1989).",
"opening_date": "1989-06-28T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 218478,
"title": "Craft in the Machine Age: European Influences on American Modernism, 1920-1945",
"description": "Craft in the Machine Age: European Influences on American Modernism, 1920-1945. American Craft Museum (organizer) (October 19, 1995-February 25, 1996); Fort Wayne Museum of Art (September 7-November 3, 1996); Akron Art Museum (January 25-March 30, 1997); Milwaukee Art Museum (June 15-August 15, 1997); Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art (September 1-November 30, 1997).",
"opening_date": "1995-10-19T00:00:00"
},
{
"id": 177916,
"title": "Burchfield to Schreckengost: Cleveland Art of the Jazz Age",
"description": "Burchfield to Schreckengost: Cleveland Art of the Jazz Age. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 28-July 18, 2004).",
"opening_date": "2004-03-28T00:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Cleveland, Ohio: The Cleveland Museum of Art; March 28 - July 18, 2004. \"Burchfield to Schreckengost: Cleveland Art of the Jazz Age\", no exhibition catalogue.",
"opening_date": "2004-03-28T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Waylande Gregory [1905-1971], Warren Township, NJ, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1930",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1930-",
"sortorder": 2
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [
"1559.1930"
],
"did_you_know": null,
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "Gregory sculpted human and animal figures in eclectic styles ranging from realistic to highly stylized, as seen in this ceramic sculpture. It depicts Gilda Gray, a dancer notorious for her \u201cbodyshaking . . . wicked torso movements\u201d performed to jazz or blues music. In the 1925 Ziegfield Follies, Gray added exotic South Seas dances to her repertoire, including the \u201cnautch dance,\u201d named after the nautch\u2014a traditional, East Indian, form-fitting, pleated dress\u2014she wore during the performance. Although Gray refused the sculptor\u2019s request for a personal modeling session, she did provide him with an onstage seat in the wings, from which he carefully studied her movements during several performances in Cleveland.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q80003818"
],
"internet_archive": []
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Basset, Mark and Naumann, Victoria. Cowan Pottery and the Cleveland School. Atglen: Schiffer Publishing Ltd., 1997. pp. 136-7.",
"page_number": "",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "American Craft Museum. Craft in the Machine Age: The History of Twentieth-Century American Craft (1920\u20131945). New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1995. p 16.",
"page_number": "",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Hawley, Henry. \u201cCowan Pottery and the Cleveland Museum of Art.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 76, no. 7 (September 1989): 238\u2013263.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 248-249, fig. 14",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25160082"
},
{
"citation": "Robinson, William H., et. al. Transformations in Cleveland Art, 1796-1946: Community and Diversity in Early Modern America. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1996.",
"page_number": "Reproduced and Mentioned: p. 172",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Frelinghuysen, Alice Cooney, and Martin P. Eidelberg. Gifts from the Fire: American Ceramics, 1880-1950 : from the Collection of Martin Eidelberg. New York : The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2021.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 172-173",
"url": ""
}
],
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"creditline": "Dudley P. Allen Fund",
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"athena_id": 111542,
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"description": "Waylande Gregory (American, 1905\u20131971)",
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"birth_year": "1905",
"death_year": "1971",
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"description": "Cowan Pottery Studio (America, Rocky River, Ohio, 1920\u20131931)",
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"role": "maker",
"biography": "The Cowan Pottery Studio was founded by R. Guy Cowan in Lakewood, Ohio, United States in 1912. It moved to Rocky River, Ohio in 1920, and operated until 1931, when the financial stress of the Great Depression resulted in its bankruptcy. Cowan Pottery produced both artistic and commercial work in a variety of styles influenced by the Arts and Crafts Movement, Art Deco, Chinese ceramics, and modern sculpture.
During its two decades of operation, a number of well-known Cleveland School artists worked with Cowan at the studio: Elizabeth Anderson, Arthur Eugene Baggs, Alexander Blazys, Paul Bogatay, Edris Eckhardt, Waylande Gregory, A. Drexler Jacobson, Raoul Josset, Paul Manship, Jos\u00e9 Martin, Herman Matzen, F. Luis Mora, Elmer L. Novotny, Margaret Postgate, Stephen Rebeck, Guy L. Rixford, Viktor Schreckengost, Elsa Vick Shaw, Walter Sinz, Frank N. Wilcox, H. Edward Winter, and Thelma Frazier Winter. With the exception of Guy Cowan, himself, Waylande Gregory designed more pieces for the pottery than anyone else. Among Cowan's finest pieces were three limited edition figures relating to dance, including \"Salome\" (1928), \"The Nautch Dancer,\" (1930), and \"The Burlesque Dancer,\" (1930). For the last two, Gregory made sketches from the side of the stage of the well-known Ziegfeld Follies star, Gilda Grey, when she was performing in Cleveland.",
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"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1930-04-22T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1930,
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"updated_at": "2026-05-29 05:54:24.152000"
}
}