William H. Bradley: Christmas 1895 – Porcelain Art Mug

Decorative figures and foliage in a flat, sinuous line: the Christmas 1895 cover for The Inland Printer is among William H. Bradley's most admired designs, seasonal warmth held inside the formal rigour of his best work. It was reproduced two years later in Les affiches étrangères illustrées, the French anthology of international poster art — which placed an American alongside the leading European designers of the period.

Bradley (1868–1962) was the foremost American practitioner of Art Nouveau poster design in the 1890s, and his work for the printing trade journal The Inland Printer rivalled the Parisian masters — Toulouse-Lautrec, Mucha, Chéret — in sophistication and ambition. He was largely self-taught, and his absorption of the European idiom through printed sources rather than direct contact gave his work a distinct character: flatter, bolder in its black-and-white contrasts, influenced by Japanese woodblock prints and by Aubrey Beardsley. His covers appeared monthly from 1894 to 1896 and were collected, traded and exhibited by readers who recognised them as art rather than advertising.

Fine porcelain, 10 oz — 104 mm high, 75 mm across the base. The image runs around the body; handle and rim stay white. Dishwasher and microwave safe.

William H. Bradley, Christmas 1895, cover for The Inland Printer, 1895; reproduced in Les affiches étrangères illustrées, 1897. Public domain in the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom; Bradley died in 1962, and this mug is therefore not sold into Switzerland.

Selected by Dr. Walther Fuchs for the Tazzarte collection.