-Mosque- still bank c. 1920s

Editor: So, here we have the "Mosque" still bank, created around the 1920s by the A.C. Williams Company. It's an intriguing metal sculpture, small and weighty. What initially strikes me is the odd sense of architectural compression, it's trying to be grand, but it’s also… a piggy bank. What do you see in it? Curator: It's like a tiny fortress of fiscal responsibility, isn’t it? This little structure, pretending to be a mosque, embodies such an American tension, right? Commerce meets… the exotic. The geometry feels so sturdy and grounded, like a financial institution should be! And yet, there's this whisper of the foreign, something faraway. Doesn't it feel like the maker saw pictures but hadn't quite grasped the reality? It becomes this strangely endearing interpretation, wouldn’t you say? Almost…naïve? Editor: Yes, naïve is a great word for it. There's a sort of charming awkwardness in its proportions. Almost like a child’s drawing of a mosque. Curator: Precisely! It begs the question: What's more compelling? Perfect accuracy, or an imaginative misunderstanding? Sometimes it's in the translation, the little creative leaps, that we uncover the most profound reflections, right? How a culture views another can be so beautifully (or hilariously) revealed through these objects. Editor: That makes so much sense. It is as if they are seeing the form and copying that rather than seeing it as a place of prayer. Curator: Think of the coins rattling inside... like prayers seeking… prosperity. Tell me, would you pray to it? I find it… cute. Editor: That’s a funny thought. Now that I think about the context and what it suggests culturally, I do see it differently. I guess the layers beneath the surface are what make this sculpture much more engaging than just a bank. Curator: Exactly! Every object carries its silent narratives, only waiting to be whispered back into life!