Artist

Gertrud Natzler

born Vienna, Austria 1908-died Los Angeles, CA 1971
Also known as
  • Gertrud Amon
  • Gertrud Amon Natzler
Born
Vienna, Austria
Died
Los Angeles, California, United States
Biography

Born in Vienna, Austria, Gertrud Natzler graduated from the Vienna Handelsakademie in 1926 and later took classes in drawing, painting, and ceramics. Also born in Vienna, Otto Natzler graduated from the Bundeslehranstalt fur Textile-Industrie in 1927 and worked as a textile designer. Both of them studied ceramics with Franz Iskra in Vienna in 1934 before organizing their own workshop in 1935. Married in 1938, the Natzlers fled Nazi-occupied Austria and immigrated to the United States, where they settled in Los Angeles.

During their thirty-six years of collaboration Gertrud threw the clay and formed it into simple pristine vessels, while her husband glazed and fired the vessels. Their objects are distinguished by the varied glazes on the surface, each glaze tested carefully by Otto and applied with consideration of the clay form with which it is paired.

Kenneth R. Trapp and Howard Risatti Skilled Work: American Craft in the Renwick Gallery (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art with the Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998)

Works by this artist (8 items)

View all artworks
Steve Ashby, Man Playing Drums, 1973, incised, painted and assembled wood, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Chuck and Jan Rosenak, 1982.114.5
Man Playing Drums
Artist
Date1973
incised, painted and assembled wood
On view
Steve Ashby, Pregnant Woman, ca. late 1960s, painted and carved wood with cloth, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Herbert Waide Hemphill, Jr. and museum purchase made possible by Ralph Cross Johnson, 1986.65.231
Pregnant Woman
Artist
Dateca. late 1960s
painted and carved wood with cloth
On view
Steve Ashby, Woman in Red Dress at Piano, ca. 1973, carved and painted plywood, found objects, magazine cutouts, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Chuck and Jan Rosenak and museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment, 1997.124.49
Woman in Red Dress at Piano
Artist
Dateca. 1973
carved and painted plywood, found objects, magazine cutouts
On view
Steve Ashby, Dancing Couple, ca. 1973, carved and painted pine, found objects, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Chuck and Jan Rosenak and museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment, 1997.124.51
Dancing Couple
Artist
Dateca. 1973
carved and painted pine, found objects
On view