Mildred G. Watkins (American, Ohio, 1883 to 1968)
Mildred Watkins was one of the first of a generation of Ohio-based artists who, in turning their attention to the medium, elevated enameling to unprecedented levels of beauty and inventiveness. She started as a painter who sort of “fell into” enameling. She studied portraiture at the Cleveland School of Art, but was not fond of laboring over her paintings, saying that “anything she did after the second day only served to spoil her drawing.” Finishing her work quickly afforded her the extra time to “lurk” in the design department and she soon decided that design was her real calling and that working with metals would be her career choice.
Literature: Painting with Fire, Masters of Enameling in America 1930-1980.
Information courtesy of Skinner, Inc., March 2010.