Churn 1935 - 1942

Frank Fumagalli made this drawing of a churn, likely in watercolor, without a set date. The way Fumagalli uses color here feels almost like he's building the form from the inside out. The pale grays and browns create a soft, mottled surface, like the churn is emerging from the paper itself. It's really about the process, right? The slow build-up of tone and texture. If you look closely, especially near the bottom, you can see these tiny vertical strokes. They’re subtle, but they give the churn a sense of weight and grounding. It's a really intimate rendering, you can almost feel the artist's hand moving across the page. Fumagalli's work reminds me a little of Giorgio Morandi, who also spent his career drawing and painting humble, everyday objects. It's like they’re both trying to find some kind of profound beauty in the mundane. Art is just this ongoing conversation across time, a beautiful mess of ideas and influences.