Bandbox c. 1937

Gilbert Sackerman’s "Bandbox" is painted on paper in colors of yellow, brown, and pink. Can you imagine the box it might have adorned? I think about the artist laying down that ground of yellow, maybe with a brush loaded just so. How would it feel to trace these looping vines with their heavy leaves, their burden of tiny blossoms? Each flower is like a little face, gazing up or down. I wonder if he felt the weight of each petal as he painted it. There’s something so endearing about folk art. It’s like a secret language spoken between the artist and the object, between the maker and the user. You can see the artist's hand, their touch. He might have been thinking about the person who would eventually own this box, the things they might have stored inside. The box might have even held a piece of his heart. In a way, painting is always a kind of bandbox, holding memories, dreams, and desires. It’s a reminder that art is not just something we look at, but something we live with.