Footstool 1939

Curator: We’re looking at “Footstool,” a 1939 watercolor and drawing by Albert Geuppert. What are your initial impressions? Editor: It has a quiet, almost domestic feel. The warm wood tones and curved legs give it a sense of understated elegance. A silent object waiting for its purpose. Curator: It’s interesting that you say ‘domestic.’ The artist uses watercolor, which is interesting; usually drawings are more in line with functional or utilitarian images like documentation. By using a typical ‘art’ material, we could suggest that Albert Geuppert isn’t documenting something, but capturing something for aesthetics’ sake. What do you read from its lines? Editor: The curvaceous cabriole legs give me Louis XV vibes – a hint of royal luxury scaled down for a modest American home perhaps. It has a historical visual lexicon we’re inheriting as we look at this footstool, speaking to the long and complex traditions and symbols that underpin material objects. Curator: True! It makes you consider class, doesn’t it? Think of the availability of raw materials. By 1939, during the later years of The Great Depression, we're getting into early murmurings of WWII... What statement might be here? Editor: Perhaps a statement about simpler comforts amidst uncertain times? There is, undoubtedly, an undercurrent of longing—a quiet aspiration—present in how the work focuses attention on domestic serenity at a very precise moment in history. Curator: Or could it be simpler? Something about the grain of the wood feels…almost reverential. In a way, it seems he treats the wood not as an ordinary material to create a mundane object, but something precious that elevates the overall visual experience of the final functional piece. Editor: Absolutely. It is also interesting how an object can evoke ideas beyond what the piece functionally IS – almost exceeding its intended boundaries into our mind space. Curator: Precisely! The convergence of aesthetic experience, labor, and socio-economic context reveals fascinating paradoxes! Editor: Definitely; and by delving into those images, we start uncovering rich symbolic territories to explore!