Copper Baptismal Font c. 1941

Curator: This watercolor, simply titled "Copper Baptismal Font," was created around 1941 by Juanita Donahoo. Editor: It’s earthy, somehow weighted down, like it's been submerged in the ground for decades. There's an appealing circularity to its tiered construction, capped by that bulbous lid. Curator: It certainly feels grounded. Baptism, of course, is a grounding ritual, a public acknowledgement and symbolic cleansing of sin within the context of community. I imagine a minister or priest filling it for an infant or a new convert to the congregation. Editor: You can almost feel the artist emphasizing texture; that concentric pattern feels deliberate, like rings rippling outward. It's interesting that Donahoo didn’t go for photorealism – the watercolor application lends an air of softening or diffusion. Curator: Given the time frame, it is very likely this piece was part of the Index of American Design project under the WPA during the New Deal. Artists were tasked with documenting examples of American material culture, folk art, and decorative arts in the styles of their regions. The copper baptismal font would likely be a crucial community fixture. Editor: Do you think this treatment abstracts or isolates it? Does that support or weaken its symbolic heft? Curator: It elevates the font, surely. It presents it as a quintessential element of American religious life. But also, a generalized or decontextualized approach served a unifying patriotic purpose at the time, especially for the audience encountering such an image in an urban museum space. Editor: It has a kind of talismanic feeling. All the little nodules around the curvature read as mystical, ritualistic in a way that's somewhat unmoored from Christianity itself. Curator: A cultural artifact imbued with a deeper symbolic purpose that can outlive its primary religious function. Editor: It’s strange to realize something as everyday as the surface appearance, the textural and proportional balance, contributes to such a read. Thanks for walking me through this one. Curator: My pleasure, as always. The WPA had such a multifaceted impact.