Sand Fountain 1948

Joseph Cornell, an assemblage artist, made this *Sand Fountain* out of mixed media. I imagine Cornell, a solitary figure in his basement, carefully constructing this little world with its newspaper-lined box, its sandy landscape, and its broken glass. The sculpture is like a stage set, and I imagine he is thinking about how the objects interact. The boxy frame makes me wonder, what kind of container is this, what's it for? How does it function? Is there some alchemical reaction at play here, with the sand trickling endlessly from one place to another? How do the textures of the sand, glass, and paper interact? Cornell’s placement of the sand and the glass almost feels like a painting, with texture, depth, and color. It's as if he’s reimagining the tradition of still life painting. I like to think that artists are always looking at each other's work. So, I like to think about how Cornell might have been looking at cubism, and thinking about how to compress space and time into a single object.