a pewter top tray table on a base by Uno Åhrén, executed in her studio, Stockholm, ca 1922-25.
The pewter top with punched and chiselled decoration of putti, faun, mermaid, dragon amidst floral ornamentation, signed A Petrus in the pewter, the base of black-lacquered birch with baluster-shaped leg on a four-sided, profiled foot. Height 50 cm, 41.5 x 41.5 cm.
Slight normal wear.
Cooperator and author Anders Hedberg (1895-1985), Stockholm.
Thence by descent to the present owner.
Hedvig Hedqvist, Rikard Jacobson & Jan von Gerber, "Modernt Svenskt Tenn", Atlantis 2004, compare pp. 18, 60.
Marie Rehnberg, "Anna Petrus - Skulptör, industrikonstnär och pionjär", Arena 2022, table base model illustrated as well as the motif on the tray for another base p. 73.
The tray and the model for the table are illustrated in the Anna Petrus archive.
With her sculptural and artistic approach to industrial art, Anna Petrus held a special position alongside contemporary designers, and contributed to a renewal of Swedish pewter art in the 1920s. Her period as an active craftswoman and sculptor was still short-lived, and early furniture like the present tray table, executed in her own studio during the 1920s, are to be regarded as real rarities.