Riveted Tortoise Shell Ring

The swirl of tortoise shell studded with silver rivets is a study in how Spratling let a humble material carry a design. Tortoise shell belongs to his later vocabulary, when he combined silver with organic and stone materials rather than working in metal alone, and here the warm, mottled surface becomes the body of the ring while the silver is reduced to the rivets that pin and animate it.

The approach reflects a habit Spratling described in his own notes, fitting silver to a worked material so the two read as one object. The contrast of cool metal against the depth of the shell is the whole point of the piece, a small object asking to be turned in the hand.

Rings from the Taxco-el-Viejo years that pair silver with tortoise shell come to market only occasionally, and the rivet detailing makes this one legible as Spratling's own hand rather than a later imitation.