Come Live With Me 1950

Tom Lovell made this illustration, Come Live With Me, without providing us the date. And I'm intrigued. The first thing I notice are those women, one asleep, one awake, and then the checkerboard quilt, with a red that's both vibrant and worn. I get the sense it's a proposal... like, 'Hey, wanna share this life, this quilt, this moment?' Lovell's painting style feels like a conversation between realism and something more idealized. Look at the way the light falls, how he captures the texture of the quilt, yet there’s an illustrative quality, a romanticized vision of domesticity. He probably wasn't thinking about the avant-garde painters of his time, but he's still part of that wider history of artists trying to capture life, emotion, and the stories we tell ourselves. It's like he’s saying, “Let’s pause here, in this shared dream, and consider what it means to connect.”