This is one of my favorite things I've ever found, purchased in Pennsylvania this summer and which I needed to live with for a bit, but which seems to me now a perfect Valentine, so here it is. Indeed, I would be willing to bet that it was made as just that, I have to think for a farmer's wife--who appears on the lid of the box, holding up, and gazing into, what I believe is a small mirror. Carved into the sides of the box are three animals--a mule on front, a cow at left, and a horse at right. For me, this box--with an interior tray that signifies it as a jewelry box--feels like an incredibly tender thing: contextualizing this woman amid her farm animals, but honoring her beauty and femininity, and maybe even a bit of vanity, too. And what a lot of love and effort put into the carving of it all, with a frame around the carved image on each side, intensively stipple carved grounds, and more stippled detailing to give pattern to the dress of the woman and spots to the cow (those udders, too.) Plus wonderfully naive faces all around. Photos do no justice to the warmth and presence of this, which an artist friend of mine, not especially interested in folk art, described to me as one of the most beautiful things she'd ever seen.
6 1/2" w x 4 1/2" d x 4" t and in very good condition, with hinges well attached and opening and closing smoothly. The lid sits just a bit higher on one side, noticeable only when viewed exactly straight on. The wood is in excellent condition and the box is in excellent structural condition. C. 1920-30s I believe.
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