Collector: Folk-art experts Linda and John Sholl
Location: May's Antique Market
Details: Folk-art experts Linda and John Sholl provide a lesson in tramp art. They have early folk treasures made from recycled materials, typically old cigar boxes. Its repetitive notch designs are easy to spot, but newcomers to tramp art might find its construction a little perplexing. Two questions are often at the tips of their tongues--how do they do that? and was it really carved by hoboes? John says that tramp art might be a misnomer, but there is a mythology, and the idea is that tramps actually made the art. Recent scholarship has indicated that a wide variety of people actually made tramp art--it was kind of a blue-collar craft that caem about after the Civil War and on into the 1930s and '40s. It was passed down from fathers to sons much like quilting was passed from mothers to daughters. John says everyone from Boy Scouts to carpenters made tramp art, but in most cases the true identity of the carver is not known.
The style was left up to the individual, but it has two defining characteristics. The first is the cedar cigar boxwood from which it was most often made (the labels from the cigar boxes can sometimes still be found on the piece), and the other is the pyramiding of tramp art--the layering of wood piece upon piece to create patterns that somehow seems both simple and complex.
In their collection is the following:
- a letterbox fashioned from a cigar box and decorated in the tramp-art style
- a rare souvenir tramp-art bank labeled Guantanamo Bay, 1936; it's valued at $280 because of the inscription and the date.
- a large box with a hidden compartment in the lid, a shadowbox containing flowers, two large compartments, and an inscription in German indicating that the box was made in 1908 or 1909; it is worth $2,000.
Its appearance is clever, to say the least, but perhaps the most interesting aspect about tramp art is its universal appeal. It's not specific to a certain region or ethnic group. If you think of cigar smoking and the fad of cigar smoking, that crossed all the industrialized countries. Thus, wherever people smoked cigars, tramp art was found.
Pieces can be found in Germany, Scandinavia, Canada, England and in the United States.
Linda and John Sholl have some cousins to tramp art pieces in their booth, including a penknife whimsy. It is a series of links, balls and cages, all carved from one piece of wood.
Resources May's Antique Market
May's Antique Market
Brimfield, MA
Phone: 413-245-9271
Website:
www.maysbrimfield.com
Guests John Sholl
Interior Designer, c/o Sholl Antiques
Norwood, NY
Phone: 315-353-2474
Linda Sholl
Interior Designer, c/o Sholl Antiques
Norwood, NY
Phone: 315-353-2474
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