Game box with four smaller boxes

Editor: Here we have an intriguing object at the Rijksmuseum, a game box with four smaller boxes from around 1734. It’s listed as being made anonymously. The wood carving gives it an ornate, baroque feel, almost like a miniature cabinet. What stands out to you when you look at it? Curator: I see the intensive labor involved in the carving and assembly. Wood was not just a material, but a resource carefully managed and manipulated. How do you think the material itself shapes our understanding of luxury at this time? Editor: That’s a good point. I guess I hadn't considered the economic value attached to the materials and the craftsmanship. The box feels decorative, almost frivolous now, but what did its materiality communicate back then? Curator: The varying grains and possibly types of wood point to broader trade networks. Each choice of material reflects consumption patterns, but also a specific act of skilled labor. Were these craftsmen considered artists, or simply laborers? What dictated that designation? Editor: So, looking beyond the aesthetics, the box becomes a window into the 18th-century economy and the status of the makers? It makes you consider all the work that went into creating something we now see as a decorative object. Curator: Exactly. Consider too the hardware and the lock. Do you believe it was primarily used for gaming? Perhaps holding precious personal items? It's a glimpse of material culture, not just an aesthetic object, and forces us to acknowledge how entwined aesthetics are with commerce. Editor: I now see the game box as this complex artifact, a product of very specific materials and social forces, it really puts the decorative-art label into perspective. Thanks! Curator: My pleasure, looking closely at materials truly opens a new way of approaching art history!