Thrift store woodblock

Can’t track down the artist. Looks like Richard Culin or Colin. Signed 1956. With the Caucasian name maybe Hawaiian?... Vietnam? Southeast Asian? Pacific Islands? I don’t know why but after thinking she looked Caribbean for a moment Vietnam immediately popped into my head. Someone more tuned in to Asian garb can hopefully identify the origin based on that or her hair. I quite like it! She actually reminds me of an ex. She was half Dominican and half Salvadoran. Hence my thinking Caribbean at first but I’m guessing it’s really Asian/Polynesian.

 

Richard Colin 56

?

 

Yes....Not sure what the question is?

 

I don't know where her garb is from? ?

 

That looks like a "M" not an "N" to me but that got me nowhere either. Sorry

 

Cuba? Haiti? Dominican? Jamaica would be a good fit too. There are lots of Jamaicans with Chinese ancestry. These days I'm told a lot of them no longer live in Jamaica.

 

Chinese ancestry? No way. There is absolutely nothing "Chinese," Polynesian, Hawaiian, Vietnamese or Pacific Islander about this lovely girl. And her "garb" is a typical 1950's dress.

 

Gotcha ! Thought it was regarding the signature.

 

Yeh I tried that too. Thanks for looking!

 

I talked to a homeless Jamaican man one day for a long time. He was telling me how he was more or less taken in by a Chinese family. They were really good to him while for whatever reason his family and fellow Jamaicans really were not. There was or maybe still is I don’t know, a good size Chinese population there. I spent nearly a year on a different island down there and there seemed to be a decent Chinese population there as well.

Edit: glad I wasn’t alone on the African based look to her. Should have stuck with my first instinct I guess. The Vietnamese theory was mine as well. I wasn’t committed to Asia at all but showed it to a wood block collector I ran into outside the store right after buying it and he was convinced it was Asian and swayed me.

 

Hmm so what would your guess be as to her ethnic background if you had to make one? Just curious.

 

You do realize that people in the Caucasus are unlikely to be called Richard Colin?

I think she is 'just' a lovely African American girl who was willing to sit for someone called Richard Colin, in 1956.

 

I agree with AJ - an African ethnic background. Whether she was born in the US, somewhere in the Caribbean, or in an African country it's not possible to say.

I think it is interesting that your OP started out with no mention whatsoever of an origin on the African continent or anywhere close to it and yet at the end you claim "glad I wasn't alone on the African based look of her."

 

She seems to be wearing a sweater, which would suggest a colder climate. Which is why I thought possibly US. There are of course people of African origin in northern Europe as well. Richard Colin could be from the UK, and have portrayed a girl in the UK.

 

She looks African-American or African-another 'New World' country to me. I think that background is subliminally making people think of bamboo & the description of the medium as woodblock leads to thoughts of Japan.

This does not sound quite like this Richard Colin, but there was an artist by that name alive in 1956:

https://www.si.edu/object/AAADCD_coll_209646

 

I think you didn’t read my post very carefully this time.
Edit: spelling

 

I think you’re exactly right. The background was the part that was throwing me off my initial instinct more than anything. Her dress still reminds me of something Asian I’ve seen but totally willing to accept it’s not the case at all. I wasn’t sure if it was a flower in her hair which led to some of the other possibilities on my list lol. Thanks for finding a Richard Colin!

 

Where did you say in this post (your OP) that you thought she was of African descent? There is no African country mentioned there. I read that post very carefully, and several times.

I'm done arguing the point. Have a good day.

 

This simpleton, who loves bamboo, thought wallpaper.

 

For me, drape, like a photographer might use.