Priscilla Mills Sold at Auction Prices

PRISCILLA "P''LLA" MILLS (1918 - 1964) Blues Singer.

PRISCILLA "P''LLA" MILLS (1918 - 1964) Blues Singer. Welded bronze on a wood base, circa 1960. Approximately 203 mm; 8- inches high, 419 mm; 16 1/2- inches including the base. Incised "P''lla" on the top of the base. Provenance: acquired directly from the artist; Miriam Matthews, Los Angeles; thence by descent to the current owner. Exhibited: GSM''s Negro Art Collection, Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company, Los Angeles, circa 1966. This sculpture was illustrated in a company publication with highlights both from the collection and loaned works from private collections. We believe this is the first sculpture by this Californian artist to come to auction. P''lla (pronounced Pela) Mills was born in Connersville, Indiana. According to the Golden State literature, she first attended the Art Institute of Chicago, and later studied ceramics under F. Carlton Ball at the University of Southern California. She exhibited her work at the Heritage Gallery, the Los Angeles Art Assocation and Paramount Studios. Like Beulah Woodard, many of her sculptures were part of the art collection of the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company. Mills and Woodard were also instrumental in founding of the artist''s space Eleven Associated Artists - a short-lived cooperative which included William Pajaud, Alice Gafford and Tyrus Wong. In a September 1963 issue of Ebony magazine, with a focus on the various roles of African-American women in society, Mills was profiled for her profession as an artist. Her work is found today in the collection of the Californian African American Museum, Los Angeles. Jones p. 151; Widener p. 86.