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Lera Colyer
1906 - 1987

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• Birth	24 Jan 1906	Pulaski County, Kentucky   [1]
  Gender	Female
  Died	17 Jan 1987	Chicago, Cook County, Illinois   [1]
  Buried	Clay Hill Cem., E Hwy 80 to Rt. 192, Ruth Community   [2]
  Person ID	I00798	John Colyer family of Somerset Ky
  Last Modified	28 May 2023

  
  

  Father	John Wesley (some say Perry) Colyer,   b. 26 Jan 1875, Pulaski County, Kentucky ,   d. 1 Jun 1937, Pulaski County, Kentucky
  Mother	Lillie Jane Woolsey,   b. 18 Aug 1880, Pulaski County, Kentucky ,   d. 22 Jan 1937, Pulaski County, Kentucky
  Married	28 Dec 1898	Pulaski County, Kentucky
  Family ID	F07673	Group Sheet

  
  

  Family	Frank Sokolik,   b. Abt 1909,   d. 28 Jul 1984, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois
  Married	28 Dec 1950	Chicago, Cook County, Illinois   [1]
  Notes	Lera Colyer in the Cook County, Illinois Marriage Index, 1930-1960 Name: Lera Colyer Marriage Date: 28 Dec 1950 Spouse: Frank T. Sokolik Marriage Location: Cook County, IL Marriage license: {A63CCD78-731B-4D0D-BA74-FB2DF5660983} File Number: 2165525 Archive Collection Name: Cook County Genealogy Records (Marriages) Archive repository location: Chicago, IL Archive repository name: Cook County Clerk
  Last Modified	16 Aug 2016
  Family ID	F07751	Group Sheet

  
  

• Photos		Painting by Lera Colyer of family farm on highway 192 Somerset KY From John Parsons, nephew :The house and barn sat on top of a little hill facing Ruth road and this was looking from one of the hills to the rear that is now where the bypass goes through
  		Jewelry designed by Lera Colyer as student 1 Courtesy of Bauhaus Chicago Foundation
  		Jewelry designed by Lera Colyer as student 2 Courtesy of Chicago Bauhaus Foundation
  		Jewelry designed by Lera Colyer as student 3 Courtesy Chicago Bauhaus Foundation
  		Jewelry designed by Lera Colyer as student Courtesy Chicago Bauhaus Foundation
  		Jewelry designed by Lera Colyer as student 4 Courtesy Chicago Bauhaus Foundation
  		2017 Los Angeles Times article on Palm Springs art exhibit Charles Hollis Jones, Lera Colyer teacher Maholy-Nagy
  		Lera Colyer in self-made costume as Plexiglass age Louisville Courier Journal 1946
  		Circ 1945 Lera Colyer standing holding cigarette 3rd to left of Lazlo Maholy-Nagy Institute of Design Chicago From Elmer Ray Pearson photog files Chicago History Museum
  		Lera Colyer circ 1986 seated with Bea Takeuchi photo by Elmer Ray Pearson photographer at Institute Design Chicago Bauhaus reunion From institute Design Illinois Institute Technology Chicago archives
  		Pilcher Compact case, believed to be a Lera Colyer design from Chicago Bauhaus days See 1950 Louisville Ky Courier Journal article note for Lera, wherein it states she is designing remotely from Chicago Silk Screen prints for ladies compact cases
  		Art Institute Chicago display of Lera Colyer Jewelry 1951

  
  

  Documents		1946 Louisville Courier Journal Article on Lera Colyer artist
  		1950 Louisville Courier Journal article on Lera Colyer artist Maholy-Nagy protege
  		Article on Frank Sokolik, mentions wife Lera Colyer
  		Lera Colyer exhibit, Chicago Tribune
  		Lera Colyer, Chicago Tribune 1969 art fair
  		Lera Colyer: 1944 article citing work with Maholy-Nagy in Chicago Louisville Courier Journal 9/10/1944
  		Lera Colyer 1935 Speed Museum, Louisville Louisville Courier Journal 9/29/1935 page 9
  		Lera Colyer painting 1936 Louisville Courier Journal 5/8/1936
  		Lera Colyer painting award Ky Womens Club Lousiville Courier Journal 5/17/1936
  		Lera Colyer in Chicago 1947 Louisville Courier Journal 3/30/1947
  		Lily (Mrs. John Colyer) Colyer Obit Mother of Lera Colyer, Somerset Ky The Commonwealth 01/27/1937
  		Lera Colyer opens Art Shop Richmond Ky 1930 Somerset Ky The Commonwealth newspaper 11/12/1930
  		1974 talk by Nathan Lerner on Chicago Bauhaus Illinois Institute Design Mentions the number of students up through 1945 being 35 and Frank Sokolik as a teacher. Frank Sokolik was husband of Lera Colyer, who moved to Chicago from Louisville in December 1950 upon marriage.
  		Lera Colyer, Chicago public library artist profile archives Lera handwritten 1960 profile
  		1945 May, Lera Colyer article Somerset Commonwealth newspaper reprint concerning lucite slipper work and Maholy Nagy study.
  		1945 Somerset Journal article on Lera Colyer details study with Maholy Nagy in Chicago and use of lucite for slippers
  		1939 Mary Belle Colyer Mills newspaper Mary Bells writes to editor of her life as a widow and working as a home nurse. Evidently helping others with either babies or elderly. She mentions Lillie Colyer. Lillie was married to John W Colyer born 1875. Their children included Ola Colyer Parsons and Lera Colyer Sokolik. This may explain a photo of Ola Parsons with Mary Belle Mills daughter, Addie at the John Perry Colyer farm he inherited from father Lindsey Robert Colyer. Also mentioned is Zula Perkins who was mother to Hazel Ledford(classmate to Jack Curtis and Somerset Ky historian)

  
  

  Headstones

  Lera Colyer Sokolik grave Clay Hill Baptist Church cemetery Somerset KY

  
  

• Notes

  Per 1933 Somerset Methodist Church located East Mt. Vernon St., directory on this site: Lera was a member. Commonwealth Journal 7/5/2014 reprint of March 7,1951 Jewelry lady A picture of Mrs. Frank Sokolik of Chicago and a story of a display of her modern jewelry at the Louisville Library?s Junior Art Gallery were carried in Tuesday?s Louisville Times. Mrs. Sokolik before her marriage was Miss Lera Colyer of Somerset. She is a sister of Mrs. Henry Parsons and was born and raised here. 1947 Louisville Courier Journal Lera Colyer In Chicago A MARY NAY, head of the Art Center, has been visiting in Chicago with Lera Colyer who used to share her apartment on Fourth Street At a squint, you could see the artists' touch around the place Mary's and Lera's paintings, plastic tables and lamp shades made by Lera, some beautiful pieces of driftwood that they picked up on the river bank and painted. Lera's move to Chicago is only temporary and the apartment is still her home base. She is studying painting at the Chicago Institute of Design. At the same time, she's doing her Louisville job by remote control, designing vanities. For quite some time, Lera has been famous here for her jewelry. Louisville Courier Journal June 4, 1987 SOMERSET - A memorial graveside service for Lera Colyer Sokolik, 80, formerly of Somerset, will be at noon Saturday at Clay Hill Cemetery. She died Jan. 17 in Chicago and the body was cremated. Somerset Undertaking Co. is in charge of arrangements. The Somerset Journal The Oldest Democratic Newspaper in the Mountains of Kentucky Feese & Williams Somerset, Ky., Friday, October 15, 1920. Soules Chapel. Lindsay and Zella Cundiff and Maude McDowell and others went to the pie supper given by Mabel Cundiff at Sweeney Chapel Friday night. It amounted to $59.80 ? C.T. Cundiff had his buckwheat threshed and it averaged 25 bushels per acre .. Mrs. Earl Dickerman has returned to California after a lengthy visit with her people ? Misses Lera and Marie Colyer spent Saturday night with Helen and Lillian Cundiff .. Louisville Courier Journal Jan 15, 1950 pg 68 inventive Designer Lera Colyer's exhibition of her paintings, jewelry and creations in plastics at the Little Gallery, which closed last week, proved her an inventive designer. Born in Somerset, Ky., she got her first art training with Paul Plaschke, then of Louisville, now of Chicago. Plaschke is a hard-hitting cartoonist but also a solid, conservative painter of the realistic school. Combining extremes, Lera Colyer, after some study at the Louisville Art Center, continued her art studies in Chicago with the late Moholy-Nagy at the ultra-modern Institute of Design in Chicago. Her present work shows no trace of Plaschke, but many traces of Moholy-Nagy's ingenious use of new materials and new visual grammar. From Moholy-Nagy she learned the exactitude of constructivistic techniques, the precise operation of all pictorial elements in abstract compositions. Her painting, although always inventive, does not strike me as the most important part of her work. Where the skill of particular crafts is involved, as in her jewelry and work in plastics, she produces her best work. Miss Colyer shares a studio with Mary Spencer Nay, who had been her first teacher at the Art Center. Miss Colyer makes a living as a designer of compacts for a Louisville company, combining her free art work with applied work in product design and design for silk-screen printing. Somerset Ky The Commonwealth September 19, 1934 "Miss Lera Colyer will leave this week to study at the Louisville Art Academy." Somerset Ky The Commonwealth 11/21/1928: ?Miss ? Lera Colyer has returned from Richmond, where she bought pottery for her gift shop. From T Paul Young, founder of chicago bauhaus foundation wrote in 2019: ?Mili Thompson remembers Lera's plastic shoes - said they were way ahead of Flash Gordon ...who knows whatever happened to that pair of shoes Email from Lazlo Maholy Nagy daugher, Hattula: Dear Mr. Curtis, thank you so much for the link to Google Photos, which has information about Lera Colyer. I actually met her at a gathering at Ray Pearson?s home in Chicago in the early 1980s. After she passed away the executor of her estate very kindly send me the dinner party photograph and I was able to identify most of the people on it. Are you researching for a project on Lera? best regards, Hattula




• Sources

  [S018185] Holy Bible, presented to Ola C. Parsons Christmas 1948 by Henry andJohn Allan, Ola Parsons, (World Publishing Company, Cleveland Ohio, New York City). QUAY 3 [S28007] Jean Grumbling http://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=jcgrumbling4.