Churn c. 1936

Frank Fumagalli made this drawing of a churn, we think, sometime in the twentieth century. There's a real tenderness in the way Fumagalli uses color, sticking to these muted browns and blues. You can tell he’s thinking about how the image comes together, almost like he’s trying to coax it into being. Looking closely at the churn's surface, I see that Fumagalli doesn't hide the process. The paint is thin in places, letting the paper peek through. Those dark blue flowers are almost like explosions of color, each with its own energy. And notice the little dots trailing from the central blossom? They feel playful and free, almost like an afterthought, but they add so much life to the whole piece. It reminds me a bit of some folk art I've seen, where there's this unpretentious honesty in how things are depicted. It's not about perfection; it's about capturing the essence of a thing. And that, to me, is what art's all about: embracing the messiness and finding beauty in the unexpected.