Cardboard Pierced for Wool Work with Lithographed Legend "What is Home without A Mother" and Thin Garlands with Flowers and Leaves

Anonymous, American, 19th century

Not on view

Cardboard pierced for wool work with a lithographed legend "What is Home without A Mother" decorated with thin garlands of flowers and leaves. The letters that make up the legend are colored with red, yellow and blue; the leaves are colored with green, and there are two types of flowers in the garlands: small stylized blue hydrangeas in the horizontal garlands placed below the legend, and larger stylized roses and rose buds colored with pink towards the center of the design. The letter "A", which is positioned towards the upper-right corner of the card, is surrounded y a garland of only stylized green leaves.

This type of print would have been used in the late-19th century for wool work created by women at home, following the pattern created by the colored print over the pierced card. With cheerful mottoes such as "After house, sunshine" and "Be not weary in well-doing", in addition to the one we see in this example, and decorated with rustic motifs such as flowers, garlands, and birds, they were the perfect decoration to hang in a farmhouse parlor.

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