Silver Sugar Tongs c. 1938

Florence Grant Brown made this drawing of silver sugar tongs with graphite and watercolor. I love how the tongs appear to hover on the paper as if she wanted to capture the object’s lightness and delicacy. I can imagine Florence experimenting with the light, trying to capture how it reflects off the silver. Look closely, and you can see the subtle gradations of tone, from the bright highlights to the deeper shadows that give the tongs their form. The details feel so precise, yet the object is floating, ungrounded. It’s as if she’s thinking through the object, turning it over in her mind, figuring out how it works. The paper has some foxing, little orange spots, which create a kind of visual counterpoint to the smooth, metallic quality of the silver. These imperfections remind us of the passage of time and the beauty of the materials used to create this image. Artists are always in conversation with each other across time, you know? We keep looking and responding and finding new ways to see the world.